FEATURES AND ASSOCIATED FACTORS TO PNEUMO NIA IN CHILDREN UNDER 2 YEARS OF AGE

Background: Each year, pneumonia is the cause of death of forty thousa nd children under four years of age in America. Aim: To follow childre n from birth until two years of age and record episodes of pneumonia, their features and associated factors. Patients and methods: Four hund red thirty seven healthy newborns were followed in a public out patien t clinic of Northern Santiago until two years of age. Pneumonia was di agnosed using clinical or radiological criteria. The mothers of each c hild were interviewed in each follow up visit. Results: Two hundred te n episodes of pneumonia were detected during the study, 0.6 episodes p er child and 1.8 episodes per affected child. Sixty six percent of epi sodes occurred during the first year of age. Total prevalence was 22.4 and 14.3% during the first and second-year of age respectively. Semi annual incidence was 13.8 and 5.5% during the first and fourth semeste r respectively. Children that had pneumonia, were male in a higher pro portion, had a lower birth weight, had higher number of brothers, moth ers with less that 8 years of school courses and a lower socioeconomic level. During the first year of life, breast feeding during less than four months and a birth date during spring and summer were associated with a higher incidence of pneumonia. Seventy seven episodes, that oc curred in 48 children, required hospitalization. The hospitalization r ate for the whole cohort was 13.4% percent and 41.2% for affected chil dren. Mean hospital stay was 5.8 days. Risk factors for hospitalizatio n were male sex, less than four months of breast feeding, low birth we ight, to have brothers, a lower mother education and lower socioeconom ic level. Two children died. Conclusions: One out of three healthy new borns had pneumonia during the first year of life and a low socioecono mic level was an important risk factor.