1 Department of Global Health, Save the Children Federation, Inc., Fairfield, Connecticut.
2 Department of Pediatrics, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington.
Am J Respir Crit Care Med. 2018 May 1;197(9):1116-1127. doi: 10.1164/rccm.201711-2233CI.
Pneumonia is the leading infectious cause of death in children worldwide, with most deaths occurring in developing countries. Measuring respiratory rate is critical to the World Health Organization's guidelines for diagnosing childhood pneumonia in low-resource settings, yet it is difficult to accurately measure. We conducted a systematic review to landscape existing respiratory rate measurement technologies. We searched PubMed, Embase, and Compendex for studies published through September 2017 assessing the accuracy of respiratory rate measurement technologies in children. We identified 16 studies: 2 describing manual devices and 14 describing automated devices. Although both studies describing manual devices took place in low-resource settings, all studies describing automated devices were conducted in well-resourced settings. Direct comparison between studies was complicated by small sample size, absence of a consistent reference standard, and variations in comparison methodology. There is an urgent need for affordable and appropriate innovations that can reliably measure a child's respiratory rate in low-resource settings. Accelerating development or scale-up of these technologies could have the potential to advance childhood pneumonia diagnosis worldwide.
肺炎是全球导致儿童死亡的主要传染病，大多数死亡发生在发展中国家。测量呼吸频率对世界卫生组织在资源匮乏环境下诊断儿童肺炎的指南至关重要，但很难准确测量。我们进行了系统评价，以了解现有的呼吸频率测量技术。我们在 PubMed、Embase 和 Compendex 中搜索了截至 2017 年 9 月发表的评估儿童呼吸频率测量技术准确性的研究。我们确定了 16 项研究：2 项描述手动设备，14 项描述自动设备。尽管描述手动设备的两项研究都发生在资源匮乏的环境中，但描述自动设备的所有研究都在资源丰富的环境中进行。由于样本量小、缺乏一致的参考标准以及比较方法的差异，研究之间的直接比较变得复杂。迫切需要经济实惠且合适的创新技术，以在资源匮乏的环境中可靠地测量儿童的呼吸频率。加速这些技术的开发或推广可能有潜力在全球范围内推进儿童肺炎的诊断。
