Assessment of bacteriological profile and outcome of empyema thoracis of hospitalized children: A single center experience

Background: Empyema is often associated with the consequence of infection including pneumonia, tuberculosis, or lung abscess. This study was conducted to assess the clinico-etiological profile and outcomes of empyema thoracis cases. Materials and Methods: This was a prospective hospital-based observational study conducted from July 2019 to June 2020 which included patients of either sex, aged between 2 months to ≤12 years, with empyema thoracis confirmed by radiological evidence of pleural fluid. Clinico-etiological details were collected and presented using appropriate statistics. Results: A total of 42 patients were included in the study, of which 35.7% were aged between 4 and 7.99 years and 27 patients (64.3%) were male. Twenty (47.6%) patients had a history of cough for 7–14 days while eight had cough for >14 days; however, a total of 29 (87.9%) patients had breathing difficulty for ≤7 days. Chest pain was observed in 16.7% of patients. Chest X-ray showed that right side pleural effusion was more commonly affected than the left pleural effusion (69.0% vs. 31.0%). The most common micro-organism pleural fluid culture was Staphylococcus aureus (n = 8; 20.5%). The majority of patients with empyema thoracis had elevated levels of leukocytes (>11,000 cumm) and CRP levels (>10 mg/dL) [92.9% and 97.6%, respectively]. Conclusion: The present study showed that most of the children presented at the age of 4–7.99 years with a male predominance. S. aureus was the major organism associated with pediatric empyema in this region.