TY - JOUR T1 - Morbidity of pandemic H1N1 influenza in children with cancer. JF - Pediatr Blood Cancer Y1 - 2010 A1 - Caselli, Désirée A1 - Carraro, Francesca A1 - Castagnola, Elio A1 - Ziino, Ottavio A1 - Frenos, Stefano A1 - Milano, Giuseppe Maria A1 - Livadiotti, Susanna A1 - Cesaro, Simone A1 - Marra, Nicoletta A1 - Zanazzo, Giulio A1 - Meazza, Cristina A1 - Cellini, Monica A1 - Aricò, Maurizio KW - Adolescent KW - Antineoplastic Agents KW - Cause of Death KW - Child KW - Child, Preschool KW - Data Collection KW - Disease Outbreaks KW - Humans KW - Influenza A Virus, H1N1 Subtype KW - Influenza, Human KW - Leukemia KW - Lymphoma, Non-Hodgkin KW - Morbidity KW - Neoplasms KW - Treatment Outcome KW - Young Adult AB -

BACKGROUND: To define the mortality and the current impact of the H1N1 pandemic in pediatric hematology-oncology centers, we performed a specific survey.

PROCEDURE: Pharyngeal swabs from patients with fevers of unknown origin, flu-like symptoms or bronchopneumonia were screened for H1N1 using PCR.

RESULTS: Sixty-two patients with documented H1N1 infection were reported: 16 had recently stopped therapy, 2 were at the diagnosis stage, and 44 were receiving therapy. The clinical course was severe (requiring ICU admission) in only 1 patient, moderate (requiring hospital admission) in 38, and mild in the remaining 23 (37%), treated as outpatients. While none of the patients died of H1N1-related complications, two patients died of progressive cancer; in all of the remaining cases, symptoms resolved within 11 days. The clinical course was complicated by respiratory distress or bronchopneumonia in 10 cases. Oseltamivir was given to 82% of patients. Chemotherapy was temporarily withdrawn in 54% of cases for a median time of 21 days (range, 4-43 days).

CONCLUSION: H1N1 infection in children with cancer was not reported as the cause of death in any case but resulted in reduced intensity of anti-cancer therapy.

VL - 55 IS - 2 U1 - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20582951?dopt=Abstract ER -