Acute Allergic Reactions to Drugs in Pediatric Practice

Aim: Assessment of the clinical and epidemiological picture of acute allergic reactions to drugs in children.

Methods: A retrospective analysis of the medical documents of 76 patients aged 3-17 years hospitalized in a children`s hospital due to acute hypersensitivity reactions to drugs was carried out.

Results: The average age of patients was 7.6 years [7.0-8.2]: boys - 34, girls - 42. In most children, cutaneous manifestations of hypersensitivity prevailed. Hypersensitive reactions to drugs of the type of acute urticaria are diagnosed in 21/76 (27.6%). In 17/76 (22.4%) children there was a combined development of urticaria rash and angioedema. All clinical manifestations of acute urticaria occurred in 38/76 (50%) patients. Various skin rash variants, including spotted-papular and morbiliform exanthema, which were quite rigid to therapy, in some cases prone to pigmentation, occurred in 31/76 (40.8%) patients, while 19 of them had a combination data of eruptions with symptoms of angioedema. In total, angioedema combined with cutaneous manifestations of hypersensitivity occurred in 36/76 (47.4%) patients hospitalized for drug hypersensitivity reactions. As the etiological causes of hypersensitive reactions to drugs in the sample of children, antibacterial drugs prevailed - in 45 of 76. In 12 children hypersensitivity reaction developed with the use of cephalosporins, 25 - aminopenicillin or protected aminopenicillin, in the remaining children - after the administration of cotrimoxazole, metronidazole, nitrofurans.

Conclusion: The most common clinical manifestations of side effects on medicines in children are urticaria and morbiiform (coripiform) exanthema. Attention is drawn to the high proportion of Quincke edema in this category of children, which can be very specific for children of childhood.