1. Association of Herpes Simplex Virus Testing with Hospital Length of Stay for Infants ≤60 Days of Age Undergoing Evaluation for Meningitis
- Author
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Aronson, Paul L, Cruz, Andrea T, Freedman, Stephen B, Balamuth, Fran, Grether‐Jones, Kendra L, Lyons, Todd W, Fleming, Alesia H, Louie, Jeffrey, Mistry, Rakesh D, Garro, Aris C, Shah, Samir S, Nigrovic, Lise E, and Group, Pediatric Emergency Medicine Clinical Research Network Herpes Simplex Virus Study
- Subjects
Sexually Transmitted Infections ,Perinatal Period - Conditions Originating in Perinatal Period ,Brain Disorders ,Clinical Research ,Infectious Diseases ,Neurosciences ,Pediatric ,Prevention ,Infection ,Emergency Service ,Hospital ,Female ,Herpes Simplex ,Hospitals ,Humans ,Infant ,Infant ,Newborn ,Length of Stay ,Male ,Meningitis ,Polymerase Chain Reaction ,Pregnancy Complications ,Infectious ,Retrospective Studies ,Simplexvirus ,Pediatric Emergency Medicine Clinical Research Network (PEM CRC) Herpes Simplex Virus (HSV) Study Group ,Clinical Sciences ,General & Internal Medicine - Abstract
Although neonatal herpes simplex virus (HSV) causes significant morbidity, utilization of the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) HSV polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test remains variable. Our objective was to examine the association of CSF HSV PCR testing with length of stay (LOS) in a 20-center retrospective cohort of hospitalized infants aged ≤60 days undergoing evaluation for meningitis after adjustment for patient-level factors and clustering by center. Of 20,496 eligible infants, 7,399 (36.1%) had a CSF HSV PCR test performed, and 46 (0.6% of those tested) had a positive test. Infants who had a CSF HSV PCR test performed had a 23% longer hospital LOS (incident rate ratio 1.23; 95% CI: 1.14-1.33). Targeted CSF HSV PCR testing may mitigate the impact on LOS for low-risk infants.
- Published
- 2019