Primary Complex or Tuberculosis in Children

By Alexander Kennard, eHow Contributor updated: June 25, 2010

Tuberculosis, sometimes called primary complex, is a disease that affects people across the world. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 100,000 children die of tuberculosis every year, and Kenyon College in Ohio claims that the disease is responsible for more deaths in young people that any other communicable disease in the world. Most child deaths caused by tuberculosis occur in low-income areas such as Southeast Asia, but on rare occasions tuberculosis can affect children in North America.

Cause
1. Tuberculosis is caused by infection from the bacteria Mycobacterium tuberculosis. It is contracted by inhaling tuberculosis bacilli, the immature form of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, in the air. Tuberculosis bacilli are spread through coughing, sneezing, breathing and talking. Once breathed in, tuberculosis bacilli can sit in the lungs for an extended period of time and may not ever develop into full-blown tuberculosis, as the WHO estimates that only 10 percent of cases develop into the disease. Fewer bacteria sit in the lungs of children infected with the disease, making them less infectious.

Symptoms

2. In the first stage of tuberculosis in a child, the bacteria infect the lungs. At this point, the bacteria may remain latent. In rare cases, the child's immune system may be strong enough at this point to fight the infection,. Four or five months later, in the next stage, the main symptoms of tuberculosis become apparent. These include pneumonia, liquid on the lungs, and collapse of the lungs. More apparent symptoms include weight loss and heavy coughing. There are no apparent symptoms in the final stage, but the bacteria are usually still present in the lungs and may cause another infection.

Diagnosis

3. Tuberculosis is difficult to diagnose in children because a lot of the methods used to diagnose the disease, such as chest radiographs, have difficulty distinguishing tuberculosis in a child from other chest and lung infections, such as pneumonia. Testing the sputum coughed up by a child is the most reliable method of diagnosing the disease, but this is complicated by the fact that most children cannot produce the amount of sputum needed for the test. Because of these factors, tuberculosis in children is often diagnosed by identifying the symptoms.

Treatment

4. It takes a long time to kill the bacteria that lead to tuberculosis. For this reason, it is important to begin treatment as quickly as possible. The drug combinations used to cure tuberculosis in adults are used in smaller doses for children and include drugs such as ethambutol, isoniazid, pyrazinamide, rifampicin and streptomycin. Almost 90 percent of the bacteria are killed within the first two weeks of treatment, according to Kenyon College. However, treatment must be

continued for six months to kill the remaining 10 percent. If treatment is not continued then there is a high risk of the re-infection.

Prevention

5. Because children are less infectious than adults, children usually pick up the disease from infected adults. For this reason, early diagnosis and treatment of adults with tuberculosis who are in close contact with children is the best way to try to prevent tuberculosis in those children. BCG immunization is a live virus vaccine developed to combat tuberculosis, and the WHO is 2004 recommended that a single dose of BCG should be given to all infants in countries with a high incidence of tuberculosis, except for infants who are confirmed as HIV-positive. In countries with low incidence of tuberculosis, the WHO stated that BCG vaccinations could be limited to those infants in high-risk groups: "In some low-burden populations, BCG vaccination has been largely replaced by intensified case detection and supervised early treatment.
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Rabies

Rabies is a preventable viral disease of mammals most often transmitted through the bite of a rabid animal. The vast majority of rabies cases reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) each year occur in wild animals like raccoons, skunks, bats, and foxes. The rabies virus infects the central nervous system, ultimately causing disease in the brain and death. The early symptoms of rabies in people are similar to that of many other illnesses, including fever, headache, and general weakness or discomfort. As the disease progresses, more specific symptoms appear and may include insomnia, anxiety, confusion, slight or partial paralysis, excitation, hallucinations, agitation, hypersalivation (increase in saliva), difficulty swallowing, and hydrophobia (fear of water). Death usually occurs within days of the onset of these symptoms. The rabies virus is transmitted through saliva or brain/nervous system tissue. You can only get rabies by coming in contact with these specific bodily excretions and tissues.

Rabies Exposure: When should I seek medical attention?

Its important to remember that rabies is a medical urgency but not an emergency. Decisions should not be delayed. Wash any wounds immediately. One of the most effective ways to decrease the chance for infection is to wash the wound thoroughly with soap and water. See your doctor for attention for any trauma due to an animal attack before considering the need for rabies vaccination.

Your doctor, possibly in consultation with your state or local health department, will decide if you need a rabies vaccination. Decisions to start vaccination, known as postexposure prophylaxis (PEP), will be based on your type of exposure and the animal you were exposed to, as well as laboratory and surveillance information for the geographic area where the exposure occurred. In the United States, postexposure prophylaxis consists of a regimen of one dose of immune globulin and four doses of rabies vaccine over a 14-day period. Rabies immune globulin and the first dose of rabies vaccine should be given by your health care provider as soon as possible after exposure. Additional doses or rabies vaccine should be given on days 3, 7, and 14 after the first vaccination. Current vaccines are relatively painless and are given in your arm, like a flu or tetanus vaccine.

What care will I receive?

Wound Care
Regardless of the risk of rabies, bite wounds can cause serious injury such as nerve or tendon laceration and local and system infection. Your doctor will determine the best way to care for your wound, and will also consider how to treat the wound for the best possible cosmetic results. For many types of bite wounds, immediate gentle irrigation with water or a dilute water povidone-iodine solution has been shown to markedly decrease the risk of bacterial infection. Wound cleansing is especially important in rabies prevention since, in animal studies, thorough wound cleansing alone without other postexposure prophylaxis has been shown to markedly reduce the likelihood of rabies. You should receive a tetanus shot if you have not been immunized in ten years. Decisions regarding the use of antibiotics, and primary wound closure should be decided together with your doctor. For people who have never been vaccinated against rabies previously, postexposure anti-rabies vaccination should always include administration of both passive antibody and vaccine. The combination of human rabies immune globulin (HRIG) and vaccine is recommended for both bite and nonbite exposures, regardless of the interval between exposure and initiation of treatment. People who have been previously vaccinated or are receiving preexposure vaccination for rabies should receive only vaccine. Adverse reactions to rabies vaccine and immune globulin are not common. Newer vaccines in use today cause fewer adverse reactions than previously available vaccines. Mild, local reactions to the rabies vaccine, such as pain, redness, swelling, or itching at the injection site, have been

reported. Rarely, symptoms such as headache, nausea, abdominal pain, muscle aches, and dizziness have been reported. Local pain and low-grade fever may follow injection of rabies immune globulin. The vaccine should be given at recommended intervals for best results. Talk to your with your doctor or state or local public health officials if you will not be able to have shot at the recommended interval. Rabies prevention is a serious matter and changes should not be made in the schedule of doses. People cannot transmit rabies to other people unless they themselves are sick with rabies. The prophylaxis you are receiving will protect you from developing rabies, and therefore you cannot expose other people to rabies. You should continue to participate in your normal activities.

What is the risk for my pet?

Any animal bitten or scratched by either a wild, carnivorous mammal or a bat that is not available for testing should be regarded as having been exposed to rabies. Unvaccinated dogs, cats, and ferrets exposed to a rabid animal should be euthanized immediately. If the owner is unwilling to have this done, the animal should be placed in strict isolation for 6 months and vaccinated 1 month before being released. Animals with expired vaccinations need to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. Dogs and cats that are currently vaccinated are kept under observation for 45 days. Small mammals such as squirrels, rats, mice, hamsters, guinea pigs, gerbils, chipmunks, rabbits, and hares are almost never found to be infected with rabies and have not been known to cause rabies among humans in the United States. Bites by these animals are usually not considered a risk of rabies unless the animal was sick or behaving in any unusual manner and rabies is widespread in your area. However, from 1985 through 1994, woodchucks accounted for 86% of the 368 cases of rabies among rodents reported to CDC. Woodchucks or groundhogs (Marmota monax) are the only rodents that may be frequently submitted to state health department because of a suspicion of rabies. In all cases involving rodents, the state or local health department should be consulted before a decision is made to initiate postexposure prophylaxis (PEP).

What are the signs and symptoms of rabies?

The first symptoms of rabies may be very similar to those of the flu including general weakness or discomfort, fever, or headache. These symptoms may last for days. There may be also discomfort or a prickling or itching sensation at the site of bite, progressing within days to symptoms of cerebral dysfunction, anxiety, confusion, agitation. As the disease

progresses, the person may experience delirium, abnormal behavior, hallucinations, and insomnia. The acute period of disease typically ends after 2 to 10 days. Once clinical signs of rabies appear, the disease is nearly always fatal, and treatment is typically supportive. Disease prevention includes administration of both passive antibody, through an injection of human immune globulin and a round of injections with rabies vaccine. Once a person begins to exhibit signs of the disease, survival is rare. To date less than 10 documented cases of human survival from clinical rabies have been reported and only two have not had a history of pre- or postexposure prophylaxis.

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