Radiologic and clinical findings of mycoplasma pneumonia in children

Mycoplasma Pneumonia is a cause of primary atypical pneumonia, but it is asymptomatic mostly or may cause ofonly mild symptoms. School-aged children experienced high attack rate and mainfestations of "unusual pneumonia"are noted. So authors reviewed clinical and radiological features of 110 cases of serologically proven Mycoplasmapneumonia in hositalized children between November 1984 and January 1987 retrospectively. The results were asfollows; 1. The sex distrubution was 57:53(1.1:1) in male to female ratio and 47% of them were 5 through 8 yearsold of age with peak incidence between 5 and 6 years old of age. 2. The symptoms were cough, fever, and sorethroat in decending order of frequency and mean symptom duration before admission was 8.1 day. The prevalentseason was earlier winter. 3. The radiologic findings were air-space consolidation with lobar, segmentaldistribution in 68%, interstitial infiltration in 12%, bronchopneumonia in 12%, chronic bronchitis pattern in 3.6%, normal in 4.5%. hilar LN enlargement in 37%, pleural effusion in 12%. 4. Radiologic resolution period wasusually 10 days around (4-25 days) and after complete recovery, scarring change or calcification was not seen. 5.Extrapulmonary manifestations were uncommon but hepatitis, hematuria, skin rash, gastroenteritis, myocarditis,otitis media occurred. 6. With administration of tetracyclin and erythromycin, clinical and radiologic responseswere promptly seen.