How COVID-19 Pandemic Changed Children and Adolescents Use of the Emergency Department: the Experience of a Secondary Care Pediatric Unit in Central Italy.

Italy was the first European country hit by SARS-CoV-2 infection, particularly northern regions. After the beginning of national lockdown (March 9th, 2020), we observed a significant decrease in pediatric emergency department consultations (daily pediatric visits; pre-lockdown, 16 (11-22); lockdown, 3 (1-3); phase 2, 3 (3-5), p < 0.0001). On the other hand, the percentage of children discharged right after pediatric visit significantly decreased from 80% in January to 50% in April. After March 9th, we registered a change in the diagnoses of emergency department visits, with an increase in the percentage of non-infectious acute conditions and a decrease in infectious diseases, with two cases of a noteworthy delayed access to hospital care. We performed a retrospective analysis of consultations requested to our pediatric unit for children and adolescents referred to the general Emergency Department of San Luca Hospital of Lucca (Tuscany, Central Italy) from January 1st to May 31st, 2020. We split data in two different time periods according to consultations performed before (January 1st-March 8th) and after the beginning of lockdown (March 9th-May 31st). Analyzing the number of children hospitalized from January to May 2020 in comparison with the same period in 2019, a decreased hospitalization became evident after March (March - 74.6%, April - 71.6%, May - 58.6%). Nasopharyngeal swabs done in 115 children showed only one case of COVID-19. Even if COVID-19 outbreak more seriously affected Northern Italy, utilization of pediatric emergency services significantly changed also in Central Italy with consequent reduced demand and increased appropriateness.

Fluoroquinolones in children: update of the literature.

The use of fluoroquinolones (FQ), antibiotics, which have excellent pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic characteristics and a broad spectrum of action, has increased dramatically in recent years, both in adults and children. Numerous safety and efficacy data are now available on FQ use in children, particularly regarding the treatment of complicated infections of the urinary tract, typhoid fever, pneumonia, acute external otitis, acute media otitis, meningoencephalitis, sepsis in neutropenic children and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), though sometimes studies have the limitations that they were conducted in selected populations, such as children with cystic fibrosis. Despite available safety data are encouraging, there is still an open debate on the toxicity of this class of antibiotics on weight-bearing joints in children. Not being able to exclude the possibility that, in rare cases, this event is likely to occur, their use in children should be limited to cases where the cost-benefit has been carefully examined, for example, in the case of sepsis or other severe infections from multi-resistant bacteria and not responsive to other classes of drugs. Furthermore, considering the increased use of FQ in children, it is possible that there is an increase in the incidence of infections from resistant germs (such as Escherichia coli, and pneumococci), as occurred in adults. In order to limit the diffusion of resistance, a judicious and appropriate use of this class of drugs is recommended.