Study of mumps in children attending a tertiary care centre

Abstract

Introduction: Mumps is a self-limiting viral infection of the salivary glands with systemic manifestations and complications. It primarily affects young children, with increased incidence in winter and spring. Mumps infection is endemic in developing countries because of poor vaccination coverage. This study is intended to highlight the increased number of mumps cases in children attending tertiary care center in Nepal and thus to emphasize the importance of mumps vaccination, so as to decrease the disease occurrence and disease burden by vaccinating all children. Materials and Methods: This was a prospective study done in Civil Service Hospital of Nepal over a period of 2 years from November 2009 to October 2011. All children less than 14years of age with symptoms of fever and parotid swelling were included in the study group. A detailed history pertaining to the disease was taken, that included; history of exposure and prior vaccination against mumps. Children were asked to follow up either after 5 days or in case of noticing any signs and symptoms of complication. Results: There were total 113 cases diagnosed clinically as mumps of which there were 71 males (62.83%) and 42 females (37.16%) with the peak incidence of disease in the month of March and September with 22 cases (19.46%) in each month. The increase incidence was seen in 4-6 years of age with 58 cases (51.32%). There were 70 patients (61.94%) that had history of exposure to mumps infection. All the patients in this study had either unilateral or bilateral parotitis. None of the children were vaccinated against mumps. And all the school going children had to be offschool for a period of 3-5 days. Conclusion: There were large number of children with mumps and none of them were vaccinated. Child can be prevented from the infection by vaccination and thus avoiding possible sufferings and complications. Thus we recommend the use of mumps vaccination in Routine immunization programme.