Hospital admissions for wheezing in Polynesian children.

The purpose of this study is to establish a baseline of information about pre-school Polynesian children hospitalised with wheezing attacks. During a one year study period at Wellington Hospital, 19 percent of the acute paediatric admissions under five years were Polynesians with wheezing respiratory disease. Seventy percent of these admissions were in children under 18 months of age, and 38 percent of the children were readmitted during the year. These and other variables are compared to European children hospitalised with wheezing. We conclude that young Polynesian children in New Zealand are especially prone to a different pattern of asthma from European children.