Diagnoses, infections and injuries in Northern Syrian children during the civil war: A cross-sectional study

PLoS One

Mohammad Al Safadi¹  Gerlant van Berlaer²  Atef Redwan²  Ronald Buyl³  Michel Debacker⁴  Saad Souhil Saeed⁵  Abdallah Mohamed Elsafti⁶  Ives Hubloue⁶ 

[1] Department of Emergency Medicine, Hamad Medical Corporation, Doha, Qatar;Department of Emergency Medicine, Universitair Ziekenhuis Brussel, Brussels, Belgium;Department of Paediatric Cardiology, Hamad General Hospital, Doha, Qatar;Department of Public Health, Biostatistics and Medical Informatics Research Group, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium;Qatar Red Crescent, Medical Office for Turkey and Syria, Turkey Mission, Doha, Qatar;Research Group on Emergency and Disaster Medicine, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium

关键词: Children;    Respiratory infections;    Pediatrics;    Infectious diseases;    Diagnostic medicine;    Syria;    Malnutrition;    Poliomyelitis;   

DOI  :  10.1371/journal.pone.0182770

学科分类：医学（综合）

来源: Public Library of Science

【 摘 要 】

Background The civil war in Syria including the deliberate targeting of healthcare services resulted in a complex humanitarian emergency, seriously affecting children's health. The objectives of this study are to document diagnoses and disease categories in Northern Syrian children after four years of conflict, and to document infectious diseases and injuries in this vulnerable population. Methods In a prospective cross-sectional observational sample study conducted in May 2015, healthcare workers registered demographics, comorbidities, and diagnoses (categorised according to the International Classification of Diseases version 10) in children visited at home and in internally displaced persons camps in four Syrian governorates. Results Of 1080 filled-out records, 1002 were included. Children originated from Aleppo (41%), Idleb (36%), Hamah (15%) and Lattakia (8%). Median age was 6 years (0–15; IQR 3–11), 61% were boys, 40% were younger than 5 years old. Children suffered from respiratory (29%), neurological (19%), digestive (17%), eye (5%) and skin (5%) diseases. Clinical malnutrition was seen in 4%, accidental injury in 3%, intentional injury in 1%, and mental disorders in 2%. Overall, 64% had features of infectious diseases (OR 0.635; CI 0.605–0.665). Most common comorbidities were chronic respiratory diseases (14, malnutrition (5%), acute flaccid paralysis (5%), and epilepsy (4%). Logistic regression analysis indicated that the risk for children to have communicable diseases was higher in Aleppo than in Idleb (OR 1.7; CI 1.2–2.3), Hamah (OR 4.9; CI 3.3–7.5), or Lattakia (OR 5.5; CI 3.3–9.3). Children in Aleppo and Lattakia were more at risk to be injured than in Idleb (OR 5.6; CI 2.1–14.3), or in Hamah (OR 5.9; CI 1.4–25.6), but more often from intentional violence in Lattakia. Mental problems were more prominent in Hamah. Conclusions Four years far in the conflict, 64% of the studied children in four Northern Syrian governorates suffer from infections, mostly from respiratory, neurological and digestive origin, while 4% was injured or victim of intentional aggression. Substandard living conditions and the lack of paediatric healthcare put Syrian children at risk for serious infections, epidemics and morbidity, and ask for urgent international humanitarian relief efforts.

【 授权许可】

CC BY