Respiratory Syncytial Virus Infection in Children

Excerpt

The human respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is one of the most common viruses to infect children worldwide and increasingly is recognized as an important pathogen in adults, especially the elderly. The most common clinical scenario encountered in RSV infection is an upper respiratory infection, but RSV commonly presents in young children as bronchiolitis, a lower respiratory tract illness with small airway obstruction, and can rarely progress to pneumonia, respiratory failure, apnea, and death. The mainstay of treatment for the vast majority of RSV infections is supportive, but passive preventive immunization is available for at-risk children, including premature infants and infants with a history of cardiac, pulmonary, or neuromuscular diseases. There is a single antiviral treatment for RSV currently approved, but its use is limited by questionable efficacy, side effects, and cost, and it is recommended that it be used only for patients at risk for severe disease, on a case-by-case basis.