Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Oct;62(9):1048-1058.
doi: 10.1177/00099228221150605. Epub 2023 Jan 20.

Hospital and ICU Admission Risk Associated With Comorbidities Among Children With COVID-19 Ancestral Strains

Stephanie P Ungar  1 , Sadie Solomon  2 , Anna Stachel  2 , Gail F Shust  1 , Katharine N Clouser  3 , Sejal M Bhavsar  3 , Jennifer Lighter  1
Affiliations

Hospital and ICU Admission Risk Associated With Comorbidities Among Children With COVID-19 Ancestral Strains

Stephanie P Ungar et al. Clin Pediatr (Phila). 2023 Oct.

Abstract

A large proportion of children have been affected by COVID-19; we evaluated the association between comorbidities and hospitalization/ICU (intensive care unit) admission among 4097 children under age 21 years with symptomatic COVID-19 (not just polymerase chain reaction [PCR]-positive or multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children associated with COVID-19 [MIS-C]) from 2 large health systems from March 2020 to September 2021. Significant comorbidities and demographic factors identified by univariable analysis were included in a multivariable logistic regression compared with children ages 6 to 11 without comorbidities. In all, 475 children (11.6%) were hospitalized, of whom 25.5% required ICU admission. Children under 1 year had high hospitalization risk, but low risk of ICU admission. Presence of at least 1 comorbidity was associated with hospitalization and ICU admission (odds ratio [OR] > 4). Asthma, obesity, chronic kidney disease, sickle cell disease, bone marrow transplantation, and neurologic disorders were associated with hospitalization (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] > 2). Malignancy, intellectual disability, and prematurity were associated with ICU admission (AOR > 4). Comorbidities are significantly associated with hospitalization/ICU admission among children with COVID-19.

Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; children; risk.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

References

    1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. COVID data tracker: United States at a glance. Date unknown. Accessed December 12, 2022. Updated December 12, 2022. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#datatracker-home.
    1. American Academy of Pediatrics. Children and COVID-19: state-level data report. Date unknown. Accessed December 12, 2022. Updated December 8, 2022. https://services.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19-infect....
    1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Demographic trends of COVID-19 cases and deaths in the US reported to CDC. Date unknown. Accessed December 12, 2022. Updated December 12, 2022. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#demographics.
    1. United States Census Bureau. QuickFacts: United States. Date unknown. Accessed July 13, 2021. Updated 2019. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045219.
    1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. COVID-19: people with certain medical conditions. Date unknown. Accessed August 1, 2021. Updated May 13, 2021. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precautions/people-....

Supplementary concepts