Main Cause Of Hospitalization Research Articles

Prescrição de antimicrobianos para idosos hospitalizados: análise do benefício e associação com implementação de limitação de esforço terapêutico e cuidados paliativos

Justificativa e Objetivos: Muitos avanços ocorreram em prevenção, diagnóstico e tratamento das doenças infecciosas, porém elas ainda são as principais causas de hospitalização e morte em idosos. O objetivo deste trabalho foi verificar o benefício do uso de antimicrobianos e sua associação com a implementação de outras medidas terapêuticas e com a indicação de cuidados paliativos nas duas últimas semanas de vida de idosos em internação hospitalar, a fim de subsidiar o desenvolvimento de modelos racionais de prescrição para este grupo. Métodos: Foi desenvolvido um estudo retrospectivo realizado pela análise de prontuários dos idosos participantes do estudo epidemiológico do tipo coorte ―Desenvolvimento de uma linha de cuidados para o idoso no Hospital Universitário de Santa Maria‖ que apresentaram óbito como desfecho. Resultados: Dos 97 indivíduos avaliados, 89,7% (n = 87) fizeram uso de antibiótico nas duas últimas semanas de vida. Entre aqueles que utilizaram antibacteriano, 38,9% apresentaram sinais clínicos de melhora após o início do tratamento (n = 28). Assim, foi possível afirmar que não houve associação entre o alívio dos sintomas e o uso de antibacteriano (p = 0,377). Entre aqueles que se beneficiaram da antibioticoterapia, 46,4% foram indicados para infecção respiratória e 14,3% para infecção do trato urinário. Não foi encontrada dependência entre o uso de antibacteriano e as outras medidas terapêuticas adotadas (p = 0,057), nem com a indicação de cuidado paliativo (p = 0,065). Conclusão: Observou-se pouca evidência de benefício no uso de antibacteriano no grupo estudado, o que sinaliza a necessidade de uma adequação de plano de cuidado diferenciada para esse perfil de pacientes.

Reviewing the prognostic factors in myelomeningocele

The goal of this study was to analyze the factors that have an impact on morbidity and mortality in patients with myelomeningocele (MMC). A retrospective cohort study was conducted to analyze factors associated with MMC that influence the morbidity and mortality of the disease. Data were collected from medical records of children who underwent the primary repair of MMC at the Fernandes Figueira Institute-Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (IFF-Fiocruz) between January 1995 and January 2015, with a minimum follow-up of 1 year. The following variables were analyzed: demographic characteristics (gestational age, sex, and birth weight); clinical features (head circumference at birth, anatomical and functional levels of MMC, hydrocephalus, symptomatic Chiari malformation type II, neurogenic bladder, and urinary tract infection [UTI]); and surgical details such as timing of repair of MMC, age at first shunt placement, shunt surgery modality (elective or emergency), concurrent surgery (correction of MMC and shunt insertion in the same surgical procedure), incidence and cause of shunt dysfunction, use of external ventricular drain, transfontanelle puncture, surgical wound complications prior to shunting, and endoscopic treatment of hydrocephalus. A total of 231 patients with MMC were included in the analysis. Patients were followed for periods ranging from 1 to 20 years, with a mean of 6.9 years. The frequency of shunt placement was observed mainly among patients with MMC at the highest spinal levels (p < 0.01). The main causes of morbidity and mortality in patients with MMC were shunt failures, diagnosed in 91 of 193 cases (47.2%) of hydrocephalus, and repeated UTIs, in 129 of 231 cases (55.8%) of MMC; these were the main causes of hospitalization and death. Head circumference ≥ 38 cm at birth was found to be a significant risk factor for shunt revision (p < 0.001; 95% CI 1.092-1.354). Also, the lumbar functional level of MMC was associated with less revision than upper levels (p < 0.014; 95% CI 0.143-0.805). There was a significant association between recurrent UTI and thoracic functional level. Macrocephaly at birth and higher levels of the defect have an impact on worse outcome and, therefore, are a challenge to the daily practice of pediatric neurosurgery.

Falls Among the Elderly in Peruvian Andean Communities and the Rural far South of Brazil: Prevalence and Associated Factors.

Falls are the fifth leading cause of death and are one of the main causes of hospitalization. The literature about falls prevalence among older adults living in rural/remote communities in South America is scarce. To compare falls prevalence among the elderly in the Andes, Peru, and in the rural area of the municipality of Rio Grande, Rio Grande do Sul state, Brazil. Two separate cross-sectional studies were conducted in Peru, Andes (N = 413), and Brazil, Rio Grande, Rio Grande do Sul state (N = 1029). We stratified all data analysis according to location (Andes/Rio Grande). Characteristics of the samples were compared and the chi square test for proportions was used. Falls prevalence was then calculated for each independent variable and crude and adjusted prevalence ratios were estimated using Poisson Regression with robust variance. Falls prevalence in the last year was much higher in the Andes (64.1%) than in Rio Grande (25.3%). For most characteristics assessed, falls prevalence in Peru was at least double that found in Rio Grande. According to the adjusted analysis for the Andes, age (80 or more), being married, divorced and alcohol intake were significantly associated with falls. In Rio Grande, female gender and being in the 70-79 and 80 or more age ranges were associated with falls as well as those who self-rated their health as poor. This paper contributes to knowledge about falls prevalence among the elderly from rural and remote communities in two South American countries. Longitudinal multicentre studies with standardized methodologies are recommended.

Primary Health Care-Sensitive Hospitalizations in children under one year of age, from 2008 to 2014, in the State of São Paulo, Brazil

The scope of this article is to describe the trends of primary health care-sensitive (PHC) hospitalizations in children under one year of age between 2008 and 2014 in the State of São Paulo, Brazil. It is an ecological study with descriptive and analytical characteristics, based on secondary data from the national health information system. Hospitalizations were classified according to the Brazilian list of PHC hospitalizations considering the Early Neonatal, Late Neonatal and Post-Neonatal age groups. Linear regression models were adjusted for trend analysis of the 851,713 hospitalizations of children under one year of age analyzed, of which 22.6% were PHC-related. The main groups with decreases were: Bacterial pneumonia (-7.10%) and Nutritional disorders (-7.70%) in the Early neonatal phase. The main increases were: Disease related to prenatal/childbirth (+10.14%) and Immunosuppressive diseases and avoidable conditions in Post-neonatal (+14.13%) infants, among which pertussis and congenital syphilis were the main causes of hospitalization. The results showed a deficiency in the primary health care system for infants in the State of Sao Paulo. The estimated trends should be used for planning cost-effective strategies to prevent and control causes of hospitalization in children under one year of age.

Respiratory Syncityal Virus A and B: three bronchiolitis seasons in a third level hospital in Italy

BackgroundRespiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the main cause of hospitalization for bronchiolitis among infants. RSV is classified into two subtypes, A and B, whose predominance alternates during different epidemic seasons. The clinical impact of viral factors is controversial and many evidences suggest a critical role for the immune host response. Premature children are at the highest risk for severe RSV infection. The main aim of this study is to identify the different RSV subtypes circulating in the last three epidemic seasons and to evaluate whether any of them was associated with poor prognosis in term and preterm infants.MethodsWe performed a retrospective analysis of medical records for all patients aged less than one year which were hospitalized during the winter season between November 2015 and April 2018 with clinical diagnosis of bronchiolitis and nasopharyngeal aspirates positive for RSV.ResultsWe enrolled 422 children, of which 50 were born preterm. During the analysis period, we observed a significant increase in the rates of oxygen supplementation and admission to intensive care unit. The evidence shows an alternating pattern in the prevalence of RSV subtypes among term born; in each epidemic season, the prevalent serotype is the cause of the majority of the cases requiring intensive care. Conversely, RSV-A is always prevalent in preterm children and caused most of the cases requiring intensive care.ConclusionsDuring the 3 seasons analyzed, we observed an alternating prevalence of RSV A and B. While there are no differences in severity between RSV A and B in term population, RSV-A is prevalent and causes most of the severe cases in the premature group. Furthermore, an increase in RSV-related oxygen therapy and PICU admission has been documented not only in the premature population. Considering the absence of appropriate therapeutic strategies, our work emphasizes the importance of implementing prophylaxis measures against RSV and highlights the urgent need to gain knowledge about immune response to the virus, also in premature children.

Reasons for admission of individual with diabetes to the Tripoli Medical Center in 2015

BackgroundDiabetes mellitus is a complex, chronic, metabolic disease manifested in hyperglycemia and associated with various complications, Consequently, people with diabetes have higher rates of hospital admissions than the general population. There is little information about the burden of hospitalizations of diabetic patients in Libya. AimThe aim was to identify the causes of admission of individual with diabetes and to identify the risk factors for hospitalization. Patients and methodsThis is a retrospective case-series study conducted in Tripoli Medical Center, Tripoli. It covers 1037 individual with diabetes admitted between 1 January 2015 and 31 December 2015. All the data were collected from the patient files. ResultsThe mean age of the patients was 60.7 years ±15.1 standard deviation. The male-to-female ratio was 1:1. Type 2 diabetes accounted for 90.2% of the patients, 56.5% of whom had diabetes for >10 years, 40.5% had no prior chronic illness, 26.7% had hypertension, and 26.4% had multiple co-morbidities. The mean hospital stay was 6.1 days, and 60.8% of the patients were on insulin therapy. The main causes of admission were infection (23%), mainly in the chest, followed by lower extremity disease (22.4%), cardiovascular disease (19.3%), cerebrovascular disease (14.4%) and renal disease (11.8%). ConclusionsThe main causes of hospitalization as shown by this study were infections, and chronic complications of diabetes in the lower extremities and cardiovascular system. Most of the patients were >60 years old, had diabetes type 2 for >10 years, were on insulin treatment, and had no other comorbidity.

Prevención no farmacológica de las exacerbaciones en la EPOC: efecto antiinflamatorio de la actividad física

The chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is the chronic respiratory condition most prevalent in adults, caused mainly by smoking. Its burden is progressively increasing and, according to the World Health Organization, is one of the main causes of mortality and disability around the world. Patients with COPD present acute worsening of the disease, defined as acute exacerbations, which are the main cause of hospitalizations and deaths. Therefore, it is crucial to identify effective interventions focused in their prevention. Patients with COPD present dyspnoea and intolerance to exercise responsible for a progressive reduction in the level of physical activity, which is an independent risk factor for future exacerbations and mortality. On the other hand, it has been demonstrated that COPD patients with low level of physical activity present higher marker levels of systemic inflammation. Interventions able to increase the level of physical activity in COPD patients have demonstrated positive effects in quality of life and a few clinical trials suggest that improving physical activity is able to prevent exacerbations. We hypothesize that these effects could be explained by changes in systemic inflammation secondary to an increase of physical activity.

Acute heart failure and microRNA

MicroRNA is a class of non-coding, single-stranded RNA 19-24 nucleotides in length, the main function of which is to inhibit the expression of protein-coding genes at the post-transcriptional level. It is known that microRNAs are an important pathogenetic link in the development of many diseases, including cardiovascular ones. Different levels of expression of these molecules in different pathologies make microRNAs potential diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers. Numerous studies confirm the fact of changes in the profile of microRNA expression in heart failure (HF). However, it is worth noting that the vast majority of these studies included patients with stable chronic HF, while the connection of these molecules with acute HF has received far less attention. Acute HF is the main cause of hospitalization for older patients. However, taking into account the low prognostic ability of existing biological markers of HF, the search for a new biological marker with a high prognostic significance is an important task of modern medicine. The article provides a brief overview of the research on the evaluation of diagnostic and prognostic abilities of a new potential of the biomarker in acute HF.

Trastornos de la alimentación en pacientes hospitalizados en un Servicio de Salud Mental Pediátricoal Pediátrico

Eating disorders (ED) have a high prevalence during adolescence, associated with high morbidity and mortality. In our country, there are no data that characterize adolescent inpatients with ED. To describe and analyze hospitalizations of children and adolescents due to ED admitted in a Pediatric Mental Health Service (PMHS). Data were collected from the clinical record of patients with ED hospitalized in the PMHS of the Hospital Roberto del Río during 2005-2015. The following admission variables were studied: cause for hospitalization, ED type, nu tritional status, systemic involvement, and psychosocial variables (psychiatric comorbidities, family functioning, abuse, and suicide ideation/attempt). The t-Student test was used for quantitative varia bles and the chi-square or Fisher Test for qualitative variables for the comparison between groups. 93 patients were included, with an average age of 14.6 years, 84% of them were women. The most frequent diagnosis was anorexia nervosa (AN) (71%) and the most frequent cause for hospita lization was the failure of outpatient treatment, followed by suicide ideation/attempt. At admission, 40% of the patients had malnutrition, 96% psychiatric comorbidity, and 88% family dysfunction. AN was the most frequent ED among inpatients and the failure of outpatient treatment was the main cause for hospitalization. The latter could be explained, in part, by the high prevalence of family dysfunction and psychiatric comorbidity of patients and their families which would com plicate outpatient treatment.

Prevalence and incidence of kidney diseases leading to hospital admission in people living with HIV in France: an observational nationwide study

ObjectivesTo describe hospitalisations for kidney disease (KD) among people living with HIV (PLHIV) in France and to identify the factors associated with such hospitalisations since data on the epidemiology of...

État des lieux de la tuberculose pulmonaire à bacilloscopie positive à Niamey (Niger)

Tuberculosis is a major public health problem and the main reason for hospital admission in developing countries. No study of tuberculosis has been undertaken in the pulmonary/tuberculosis service of Lamordé National Hospital in Niamey since its foundation in April 2009. The aim of our study is to assess the current situation of sputum positive new and relapsed cases of tuberculosis and to determine their epidemiological, clinical and therapeutic profiles. It comprised a retrospective four-year study of the records of patients hospitalized for sputum positive pulmonary tuberculosis (433 patients), both new and relapsed cases, in the pulmonary/tuberculosis service of the Lamordé National Hospital. The latter is the unique reference and management centre for lung disease for the capital of Niger. Of the 975 patients admitted to the pulmonary/tuberculosis centre 433 had sputum positive tuberculosis, both new and relapsed cases, making up 44.5% of admissions. 76.2% were male giving a sex ratio of 3.2. The mean age of the patients was 42.6 years with a range of 2-85 years. More than half of the patients (54.7%) came from the Niamey region and 68.6% were referred from there. Antecedents were tuberculosis, HIV infection and smoking in 8.3%, 6.2% and 6%, respectively. Weight loss (80.4%), productive cough (63%) and fever (68%) were the main general and functional signs identified. Sputum examination revealed the diagnosis in 99.8% of cases and 62.1% had a chest X-ray before starting treatment. Cavitation was present in 67.3% and infiltration in 46.9%. Serology for HIV was positive in 17.1%. A treatment regime was instituted in 89.6% of new cases and 10.4% of relapsed cases. The rate of recovery was 74.6% and pleurisy, which was the most common complication, developed in 5.6%. Tuberculosis constitutes the main cause of hospitalization in the pulmonary/tuberculosis service of the Lamordé National Hospital in Niamey. It is therefore necessary to educate the public and reinforce the training of health care professionals in the management of tuberculosis.

The effectiveness of immunization of children against Pneumococcal infection in Penza, Russia

The urgency of the problem is due to the fact that respiratory diseases occupy one of the first places in the structure of child morbidity, and community-acquired pneumonia remains one of the main causes of hospitalization and mortality among children. Streptococcus pneumonia remains the leading bacterial etiological agent of community-acquired pneumonia in the total population of pathogens. The article presents a statistical study of the impact of vaccination against pneumococcus on the incidence of community-acquired pneumonia in children in Penza, Russia. It was revealed that the incidence of community-acquired pneumonia in children vaccinated with 1 3-valent conjugate pneumococcal vaccine is 3.2 times lower than in unvaccinated children.

PO 8572 CAUSES OF HOSPITALISATION AND MORTALITY IN CHILDREN UNDER 5 YEARS OLD, NATIONAL HOSPITAL OF GUINEA-BISSAU, 2015–2017

BackgroundStudying the causes of hospitalisation is useful to understand the profile of illness and identify the most effective interventions. Guinea-Bissau was projected to reduce the under-5 mortality rate from 200 to 80/1000 live births (2005–2015); and the causes of the deaths were attributed: neonatal, pneumonia, malaria and diarrhea. In 2014 the mortality rate was 55/1000 live births in Guinea-Bissau, and malaria, diarrhea and respiratory infection were the main causes of illness. The present study aims to describe the main causes of hospitalisation and death in children under 5 years in the paediatric clinic of the ‘Simão Mendes’ National Hospital.MethodDescriptive and retrospective study, with search of data from health care records. STATA and Microsoft Excel programmes were used for data analysis and cleaning. Cases defined as: children under 5 years of age, diagnosed from 2015 to 2017.ResultsIn 17,250 cases of hospitalisation, the overall lethality rate for 2015–2017 was calculated at 7.5%. There was an increase in the lethality rate (10.8%) in 2017. Among the main causes of hospitalisation were gastrointestinal infection (26.9%), malaria (23%), respiratory infection (17.6%) and septicaemia (16.1%). Septicaemia is the disease with the highest lethality rate during these three years (18%), the case fatality rate due to gastrointestinal infection in 2017 (7.7%) was double compared with 2015 and 2016; 19% of deaths occured for those who lived far from hospital (&gt;40 km).Conclusion2017 had fewer hospitalisation cases and is the year with the highest lethality rate. Gastrointestinal infection and malaria were the main causes of hospitalisation. The rate of lethality from diarrhoea and septicaemia has increased significantly and with worse outcome in those living far from Bissau.

Contribution of Fcγ Receptor-Mediated Immunity to the Pathogenesis Caused by the Human Respiratory Syncytial Virus.

The human Respiratory Syncytial Virus (hRSV) is the leading cause of severe acute lower respiratory tract infections (ALRTIs) in humans at all ages and is the main cause of hospitalization due to pneumonia, asthma, and bronchiolitis in infants. hRSV symptoms mainly develop due to an excessive host immune and inflammatory response in the respiratory tissue. hRSV infection during life is frequent and likely because of non-optimal immunological memory is developed against this virus. Vaccine development against this pathogen has been delayed after the detrimental effects produced in children by vaccination with a formalin-inactivated hRSV preparation (FI-hRSV), which caused enhanced disease upon natural viral infection. Since then, several studies have focused on understanding the mechanisms underlying such disease exacerbation. Along these lines, several studies have suggested that antibodies elicited by immunization with FI-hRSV show low neutralizing capacity and promote the formation of immune complexes containing hRSV (hRSV-ICs), which contribute to hRSV pathogenesis through the engagement of Fc gamma receptors (FcγRs) expressed on the surface of immune cells. Furthermore, a role for FcγRs is supported by studies evaluating the contribution of these molecules to hRSV-induced disease. These studies have shown that FcγRs can modulate viral clearance by the host and the inflammatory response triggered by hRSV infection. In addition, ICs can facilitate viral entry into host cells expressing FcγRs, thus extending hRSV infectivity. In this article, we discuss current knowledge relative to the contribution of hRSV-ICs and FcγRs to the pathogenesis caused by hRSV and their putative role in the exacerbation of the disease caused by this virus after FI-hRSV vaccination. A better understanding FcγRs involvement in the immune response against hRSV will contribute to the development of new prophylactic or therapeutic tools to promote virus clearance with limited inflammatory damage to the airways.

Prognostic factors in patients with active non-variceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding

Background and study aimsAcute upper gastrointestinal bleeding is one of the main causes of hospitalisation. The purpose of this study was to determine the prognostic factors in non-variceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding. Patients and methodsClinical outcomes, demographic and laboratory variables of the subjects were collected from the HIS software and national code with the SQL format from three hospitals in Qazvin. The data were linked to the database software designed by the author. Clinical and upper endoscopic findings of patients’ records were collected through a questionnaire form in the designed software database. ResultsIn this study, 29.2% of patients with favourable outcome and 64.2% of patients with unfavourable clinical outcomes had a history of anticoagulant drug use before hospitalisation (p < 0.001). The prevalence of chronic cardiovascular disease, chronic liver disease, chronic lung disease, diabetes and dialysis was higher in subjects with poor clinical outcomes than those with a favourable clinical outcome.53.1% of subjects with favourable clinical outcome and 90.5% of subjects with undesirable clinical outcomes received packed red blood cell transfusion (p < 0.001). 16.1% of subjects with desirable clinical outcome and 86.3% of subjects with undesirable clinical outcomes received endoscopic haemostatic treatment which was statistically significant (p < 0.001). ConclusionUndesirable clinical outcome in patients with acute non-variceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding has a significant statistical association with longer hospitalisation, chronic underlying disease, anticoagulant administration, packed red blood cell infusion, higher Forrest stage, low systolic blood pressure, higher age, low haemoglobin, low platelet count, high INR and high BUN at the onset of diagnosis.

Burden of hospitalisation among older people in the Brazilian public health system: a big data analysis from 2009 to 2015

BackgroundThe world’s population is progressively ageing, and this trend imposes several challenges to society and governments. The aim of this study was to investigate the burden generated by the hospitalisation...

A Telemedicine Service System Exploiting BT/BLE Wireless Sensors for Remote Management of Chronic Patients

The management of the increasing number of patients affected by cardiovascular, pulmonary, and metabolic chronic diseases represents a major challenge for the National Health System (NHS) in any developed country. Chronic diseases are indeed the main cause of hospitalization, especially for elderly people, leading to sustainability problems due to the huge amount of resources required. In the last years, the adoption of the chronic care model (CCM) as assistive model improved the management of these patients and reduced the related healthcare costs. The diffusion of wireless sensors, portable devices and connectivity enables to implement new information and communication technology (ICT)-based innovative applications to further improve the outcomes of the CCM. This paper presents a telemedicine platform for data acquisition, distribution, processing, presentation, and storage, aimed to remotely monitor the clinical status of chronic patients. The proposed solution is based on monitoring kits, with wireless Bluetooth (BT)/ Bluetooth low energy (BLE) sensors and a gateway (i.e., smartphone or tablet) connected to a web-based cloud application that collects and makes available the clinical information to the medical staff. The platform allows clinicians and practitioners to monitor at distance their patients, according to personalized treatment plans, and to act promptly in case of aggravations, reducing hospitalizations and improving patients’ quality of life.

Causes of hospital admissions and deaths among Brazilian elders between 2005 and 2015.

To analyze the ranking and percentage variation of the main causes of hospital admissions and death of Brazilian elders between 2005 and 2015, according to gender and age groups. Retrospective and temporal analysis study. The six main causes of hospitalization and death of elders were collected in DATASUS according to sex and age groups (60 ~ 79, ≥80) in 2017. Heart Failure (2005) and pneumonia (2015) were the two main causes of hospital admissions in both sexes and age groups, except for the younger group. Acute Myocardial Infarction was the main cause of death in 2005 and 2015. The second cause in the overall ranking was the Stroke in 2005 and Pneumonia in 2015. Circulatory and respiratory diseases were the main causes of hospital admissions and death among the elderly, highlighting the impotant increase in pneumonia as a cause of morbimortality.

Paucity of intrahepatic bile ducts in pediatric practice

Neonatal cholestasis is the main cause of hospitalization in a pediatric hepatology department and represents the main indication for liver transplantation in children. Besides the biliary atresia, infectious, metabolic or toxic causes, one of the important causes of neonatal cholestasis is the paucity of intrahepatic biliary ducts. Alagille syndrome represents the association of this paucity of the biliary ducts with cardiac, vascular, renal, skeletal, ocular manifestations and characteristic facies. Alagille syndrome raises important issues of diagnosis, treatment and prognosis, which makes these aspects necessary to be known by pediatricians. The differential diagnosis from biliary atresia or other causes of biliary ducts paucity is important for the management of a patient with cholestasis. In the last period, besides the clinical diagnosis, there is an increasing importance of the genetic confirmation of Alagille syndrome in a patient with cholestasis, important for the prognosis of the evolution. Liver transplantation may be an effective solution for patients with Alagille syndrome, but the particularities of post-transplant evolution should be considered.

PROFILE AND APPROPRIATE USE OF ANTIBIOTICS AMONG CHILDREN IN A GENERAL HOSPITAL IN SOUTHERN BRAZIL.

ABSTRACTObjective: To examine the profile and appropriate use of antibiotics among hospitalized children.Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted with children who had taken antibiotics during hospitalization in a private philanthropic hospital in Southern Brazil, from January to December 2015. The data were obtained by reviewing medical records, encompassing demographic data (age, gender, ethnicity, and body weight) and clinical data (causes of hospitalization, use of antibiotics, and clinical outcome). Descriptive statistics was used to present the data.Results: Of the 318 participants included in the study, 61.3% were male patients. The age range varied between 2 and 11 years, with mean age of 5.8±2.9 years. The prevalence of antibiotics was 24.4% out of the 1,346 hospitalized children. Median hospital stay was four days. The main cause of hospitalization was clinical instability, and the most commonly prescribed antibiotics was Cefazolin, mostly administered intravenously. Regarding the administration of antibiotics, 62.2% were adequately prescribed, even though underdose was 11.7%, and overdose was 14.6% in the studied patients. Antibiotic administration intervals were characterized as long in 8% of cases, and short in 3.5% of cases.Conclusions: Although the prevalence of antibiotics among hospitalized children was not that high, a considerable part of the sample presented inadequacy regarding the dosage and range of use. These data raise concerns about bacterial resistance and adverse reactions.