Iqbal Bano, Samreen Ashraf, Attia Bari, Rabia Bushra, Tahira Un Nisa, Ahsan Waheed Rathore.
Inhaled Hypertonic Saline as Add on Therapy in Children between 1 to 6 Years of Age with Acute Wheezy Episode.
Pak Paed J Jan ;42(3):182-7.

Aims & Objective: To compare the frequency of hospital admission in 1 to 6year-old children presented to the Emergency department (ED) with acute wheezing episodes treated with inhaled hypertonic saline plus salbutamol vs. standard inhaled therapy of salbutamol and normal saline. Study Design: Randomized single-blind controlled trial. Place and Duration of Study: Emergency department of The Children?s Hospital Lahore from July 2015-January 2016 Methodology: Clinical score was assessed before and 15 minutes after three nebulization sessions in emergency department. Patients were divided into two groups by lottery method. Group 1, the treatment group, received nebulization of (3%) hypertonic saline (HS) with 0.5ml salbutamol. Group 2, received nebulization of normal saline (NS) with 0.5 ml salbutamol (standard treatment). Nebulization was repeated after 20 minutes for 3 times. The children with wheeze were categorized with asthma severity score and admitted if score ? 6 after 15 minutes of 3 nebulization sessions. Results: There were total 72 children with similar baseline characteristics, 36 children in each group. The mean age of the children in HS group was 3.69 ± 1.51 years while 3.42 ± 1.79 in NS group. After emergency treatment, hospital admission in standard therapy group was in 9 (25%) patients which was significantly high as compared tohypertonic saline (HS) group i.e. 3 (8.3%) with a significant p-value (0.048) and majority were in age group of 1-3 years (p-value=0.034). Mean clinical score after treatment in standard therapy group was less i.e. 4.50 ± 2.16 as compared to HS group 5.08. Conclusion: Addition of hypertonic saline significantly reduces the hospital admission in 1-6 year old children with acute wheezeepisode as compared to patients treated with standard inhaled therapy of normal saline and salbutamol.

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