Difference in Clinical Patterns between COVID-19 Affected Children and Adults.

Coronavirus has created a major global health problem since December 2019. People of all age groups were affected by this virus though children showed milder clinical characteristics and initially less number of children was affected by this virus. It is very important to know the difference in clinical patterns between COVID-19 affected children and adults. This cross-sectional prospective study was carried out in Kurmitola General Hospital, Dhaka from April to September 2020 to compare the clinical pattern and laboratory findings between COVID-19 positive children and adults. Total 150 COVID-19 positive patients were enrolled in this study, among them 100 patients were adults (>18 year) mean±SD age (49.9±14.33) and 50 patients were children (Day 1-18 year) mean±SD age (8.7±4.79). The adult group had 66 males and 34 females and the pediatric group had 27 males and 23 females. No significant sex difference was seen between the two groups (0.153). Most of the children were affected by family contact and they showed a mild type of illness but adult patients had contact from different sources. Fever and cough were the main symptoms of both groups but fever was more common in adults (81%) than children (36%), p-value (0.001). In children no severe or critical cases were found. But asymptomatic cases were 8%, mild cases (68%) and moderate cases (24%) in children. In adults no asymptomatic patients were found. Moderate cases were 72%, severe 14% and critical 5% (p value 0.001). Leucopenia, Lymphopenia and raised CRP and increased ferritin were found more in adults than children. Chest X-ray showed 42% of children had pneumonia and 83% adults had pneumonia. There was significant difference between the two groups (p value 0.0001). This study concludes that corona virus affects children like adults but their presentation is not so severe and children show mild clinical symptoms in comparison with adults.