Hospitalization of children with status asthmaticus: a review.

A review of hospital admissions of patients with status asthmaticus at the Childrens Hospital of Los Angeles showed a marked increase in admissions in recent years. Asthma mortality did not increase. Patients tended to be young, boys, and black as compared with patients admitted to a general hospital. Interviews with 100 patients and/or their parents admitted between February and June 1988 indicated that the majority of patients had frequent, severe, and/or disabling symptoms and a significant number were undertreated. Forty-five percent of these patients and 46% of all patients admitted between January 1986 and October 1988 because of status asthmaticus also had sinusitis, otitis, or pneumonitis.