COVID-19: The impact on pediatric emergency care

Abstract

Although there is still much that is not understood, experience with previous coronavirus outbreaks and available data on COVID-19 indicate a reduced propensity to affect children. Nonetheless, serious complications—although rare—are being seen in pediatric patients. This review, written with the emergency medicine clinician in mind, describes the epidemiology, clinical features, and management implications for COVID-19 in pediatric patients. It includes a discussion of multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) associated with COVID-19, as well as other aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic that are affecting children and families, such as poisonings, childhood immunizations, mental health, nonaccidental trauma, and neglect.