Safety and parents´ acceptance of ultrasound contrast agents in children and adolescents - contrast enhanced voiding urosonography and contrast enhanced ultrasound.

Abstract

To evaluate the safety of the contrast enhanced voiding urosonography (ceVUS) and contrast enhanced ultrasound(CEUS) in children and adolescence and to receive data about parents' acceptance of intravesical and intravenous applicationof sulfur hexafluoride. In this prospective, single centre study conducted over a 1 year study period,parents of 56 children (f/m=32/24; mean age 3.1 years; range 3 weeks - 15.9 years) with ceVUS and of 30 children (f/m=15/15;mean age 10.5 years; range 2 months - 17.7 years) with CEUS agreed to be included. A standardized telephone survey aboutthe acceptance of the parents during and after the procedure as well as the adverse events (AE) were conducted within threedays of the examination. The parents would agree with the use of both ceVUS and CEUS as a diagnostic tool againin 96% (54/56) or 100% (30/30) of the cases, respectively and 92.9% (52/56) would prefer ceVUS to voiding cystourethrography(VCUG). In addition, 83.3% (25/30) would prefer CEUS to CT and 73.3% (22/30) would prefer CEUS to MRI. AE werereported in 3.6% after ceVUS (2/56; skin rash, mild fever) and in 3.3% after CEUS (1/30; vomiting). AE were subacute andself‑limited. The vast majority of parents prefer ceVUS and CEUS to VCUG, CT or MRI because of the safetyprofile of the contrast agent and diagnostic accuracy.