Descriptive epidemiology of acute respiratory infections among under five children in an urban slum area.

A study was conducted in Sunderpur Varanasi to study the magnitude of the problem of acute respiratory infections (ARIs) among under-five children in an urban slum and the clinical profile of it in order to understand the pattern of disease presentation for identifying methods of early diagnosis and timely intervention. 150 under-five children were selected by a stratified random sampling method and were observed for 52 weeks at weekly intervals to record the illnesses. In total 661 episodes were observed in 5623 child-weeks of observation giving an episode rate of 6.11/child/year. ARIs accounted for 67% of all morbidities. Mean duration of all the episodes taken together was 8.15 + 5.44 days. The majority of the episodes (88.96%) were confined to the upper respiratory tract only. The most commonly occurring clinical features were rhinorrhea nasal stuffiness and cough. 61.4% of all the episodes ended within 7 days; only 26.2% continued for 2 weeks. (authors modified)