Medical Imaging: CT Findings Of COVID-19 In Children Often Show False Negative Infections
Source: Medical Imaging Jun 01, 2020 4 years, 6 months, 3 weeks, 1 day, 4 hours, 30 minutes ago
Medical Imaging: Researchers from Icahn School Of medicine , Mount Sinai are warning clinical practitioners that a recent study they conducted revealed a high frequency of negative chest CT findings among pediatric patients with laboratory-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus disease (COVID-19), while also suggesting that bilateral, lower lobe-predominant ground-glass opacities (GGOs) are common in the subset of patients with positive CT findings.
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A and B, Unenhanced chest CT scans show minimal GGOs (right lower and left
upper lobes) (arrows) and no consolidation. Only two lobes were affected, & CT
findings were assigned CT severity score of 2. Credit: AJR
The research was published in the open-access platform: the
American Journal of Roentgenology (AJR) https://www.ajronline.org/doi/10.2214/AJR.20.23145
Dr Sharon Steinberger from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai,who is the first author of the study wrote, "To our knowledge, this case series is the largest series to date that describes the imaging findings of pediatric patients with COVID-19."
By reviewing the CT findings and clinical symptoms of 30 pediatric patients (aged 10 months to 18 years) who tested positive for COVID-19 via quantitative real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) at six centers in China from January 23 to February 8, 2020, Dr Steinberger and colleagues along with two cardiothoracic radiologists and a cardiothoracic imaging fellow characterized and scored the extent of lung involvement.
Dr Steinberger told Thailand Medical News, "CT findings were often negative ie in about 77% of the CT Scans.”
However for the positive CT findings seen in children, ground-glass opacities or GGOs with peripheral lung distribution, crazy paving pattern, as well as the halo and reverse halo signs were typically observed.
The authors of the AJR article consistent with reported symptomatology in children also observed a correlation between increasing age and increasing severity of findings.
Additional questioning the utility of CT in the diagnosis and management of COVID-19 in children, 11 of 30 patients (37%) underwent follow-up chest CT with 10 of 11 examinations (91%) showing no change.
The researchers advised doctors that when dealing with children with COVId-19, Chest CT might not be a reliable platform.
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