Abstract
Background and aimsThis study was carried out to investigate the incidence, annual time trend and some epidemiological and clinical features of Guillain-Barre syndrome in children in the north west of Iran.Materials and methodsIn this population-based cross sectional research, epidemiological and clinical features of 143 cases with Guillain-Barre syndrome between 2001 and 2006 were studied. The setting of the study was Tabriz Children Medical Centre, the major University-Hospital located in Tabriz city of the East Azarbaijan province covering whole region. Data collected included age, gender, chronological information, preceding events, functional grade of motor deficit.ResultsThe mean age (standard deviation) of subjects was 5.4 (3.6) years. The male/female ratio was 1.3. The average annual incidence rate was 2.27 per 100 000 population of 15 years children (CI95%: 1.9–2.6). The majority of cases occurred in March, July and November and the highest proportion of the syndrome was observed in winter (29 percent, P > 0.10).ConclusionThe results indicated that an unexpected high incidence of Guillain-Barre syndrome has occurred in 2003 in the region. We concluded that a monitoring and surveillance system for Guillain-Barre syndrome is essential to set up in this region.
Highlights
Background and aimsThis study was carried out to investigate the incidence, annual time trend and some epidemiological and clinical features of Guillain-Barre syndrome in children in the north west of Iran
The results indicated that an unexpected high incidence of Guillain-Barre syndrome has occurred in 2003 in the region
We concluded that a monitoring and surveillance system for Guillain-Barre syndrome is essential to set up in this region
Summary
This study was carried out to investigate the incidence, annual time trend and some epidemiological and clinical features of Guillain-Barre syndrome in children in the north west of Iran. Guillain-Barre syndrome is an autoimmune disorder of peripheral nervous system causing progressive weakness and areflexia. Since the marked decline in poliomyelitis incidence, the syndrome is the most common cause of acute flaccid paralysis in many countries [1]. Epidemiologic studies have reported an annual incidence of 0.16– 4 (mostly between 1–2) cases per 100 000 population from different countries [2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]. The aim of this study was to investigate the incidence, annual time trend and some epidemiological and clinical features of Guillain-Barre syndrome in children in the north west of Iran. The disease is considered to be sporadic without significant variation over time, some studies have shown annual and seasonal trends [5,6,7,8,11,12,13].
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