Role of Lung Ultrasound in the diagnosis and follow up of community acquired pneumonia in children

Abstract

This is a cross sectional and prospective follow-up study that included 30 patients with CAP between the ages of 1 to 16 year recruited for the in-patient wards of Children's Hospital of Ain Shams University during the period from 1st of December 2019 to 31st of January 2020. The study included 13 females and 17 males, their mean age 3.28 ± 1.57. All cases were diagnosed clinically with CAP in accordance to the BTS guidelines. Cases were subjected to full history taking, full general and chest examination, laboratory investigations on admission, a chest x-ray on day 1 of admission and LUS on days 1, 5 and 10. In this study, we aimed to determine if LUS can be a useful tool in the diagnosis of CAP. We also aimed to determine if LUS can be used in the follow up of patients with pneumonia and if it could be used to estimate the pneumonia size semi-quantitatively to monitor the progression of the disease. Our results showed a higher sensitivity for LUS in the diagnosis of CAP when compared to chest x-ray (93.3% and 80% respectively). The most common LUS finding was subpleural lung consolidation found in 93.3% of patients. And the most common chest x-ray findings were lobar pneumonia and alveolar infiltrates, both found in 40% of patients.