How dangerous is acute encephalitis in children?

This is an automatically translated article.

The article was professionally consulted by Specialist Doctor I Nguyen Thi My Linh - Neonatologist - Department of Pediatrics - Neonatology - Vinmec Danang International General Hospital. Specialist Doctor I Nguyen Thi My Linh has 12 years of experience in diagnosing and treating pediatric diseases.
Children under 10 years of age are at very high risk of acute encephalitis. The disease appears all year round, especially increases in number in June and July. Acute encephalitis directly affects the central nervous system easily leading to dangerous complications, affecting development and threatening life. threaten the child's life.

1. What is acute encephalitis?

Acute encephalitis is a condition in which the central nervous system is damaged by viruses, bacteria, and viruses that directly attack the brain, causing encephalitis, disrupting motor functions and thinking of the body.

2. Signs of acute encephalitis in children

Signs of acute encephalitis in the early stages are often confused with common fever. Children have symptoms such as:
High fever 39 - 40 degrees Celsius, sometimes it goes down, but the high fever lasts for many days in a row. Fatigue, inflexible limbs The child refuses to eat, cries, especially crying louder when picked up Severe headache, stiff neck Nausea or vomiting Children under 12 months show signs of fontanelle After a few days, if not detected and intervened, the disease will worsen with symptoms due to the influence of the central nervous system such as:
The child is lethargic, comatose, delirious, comatose The child cannot hear clearly, slurred, slurred speech, has signs of hallucinating limbs that are difficult or impossible to move movement, hemiplegia Loss of memory Convulsions... Acute encephalitis has many causes such as: Japanese encephalitis virus, intestinal virus, herpes virus, measles virus, mumps complications. .. Signs of encephalitis in children can vary depending on the virus causing the disease. To accurately detect the acute encephalitis that the child is suffering from, the doctor must perform a spinal tap to test or isolate the virus from the patient's blood. Using tomography, magnetic resonance imaging to assess the extent of brain damage.

3. How dangerous is acute encephalitis in children?

3.1. Acute encephalitis has a high probability of death or severe sequelae

The brain is the central nervous system, which regulates all movement and thought processes of the body. Brain damage can have a huge impact on your physical and mental health. The more severely the brain is damaged, the lower the recovery ability, the child may die or have lifelong sequelae such as epilepsy, cerebral palsy, mental illness, paralysis of the legs, arms, and hemiplegia. people, deaf, cognitively retarded...

Japanese encephalitis accounts for about 10-15% of cases of viral encephalitis, mainly in children aged 1-10 years. The disease spreads very quickly through mosquito bites. The virus that causes the disease can be transmitted from animals to humans, forming a large outbreak. Japanese encephalitis has a high mortality rate, up to 10-20%.
Meningococcal disease is also one of the most dangerous encephalopathy today. The disease has a high mortality rate. Even when patients are detected early and intervened immediately, there are 5-10% deaths. Patients can die only 1-2 days after the onset of symptoms. Without prompt treatment, the infant mortality rate from meningococcal meningitis is up to 50%.

3.2. Acute encephalitis has a rapid progression and long treatment time

Acute encephalitis in children has a very rapid progression. The early signs of the disease are all basic symptoms, easily confused with common feverish illnesses, making parents often subjective and do not take their children to the hospital for examination. The disease can get worse in a very short time.
Acute encephalitis usually lasts 1-3 weeks. Long treatment time, slow recovery, especially in young children. Even after being discharged from the hospital, children still need to be cared for and rested for a long time to fully recover their functions.

3.3. There is no specific treatment for acute viral encephalitis

Acute encephalitis is caused by a variety of viruses, viruses, and bacteria. Current drugs only work against a few viruses, many viruses that cause encephalitis have yet to find a cure. The current treatment process is mainly to treat the symptoms and improve the child's condition.
Some acute encephalitis in children now have vaccines such as Japanese encephalitis vaccine, but enteric virus encephalitis has not yet been vaccinated. In addition, the disease can start due to complications of infectious diseases such as measles, chickenpox, mumps... so it is difficult to predict.

When a child shows signs of acute encephalitis above, the child should be taken to the hospital for examination. The detection and diagnosis of acute encephalitis is quite complicated, requiring many modern medical equipment. Should choose hospitals with full equipment and support machines to be able to accurately detect the disease that the child is suffering from, to avoid prolonged illness that causes severe brain damage.
Vinmec Times City International General Hospital owns today's top quality General Pediatrics and Specialty Clinics. The clinic is fully equipped with advanced medical equipment, helping to detect pediatric diseases in general and acute encephalitis in children in particular easily and quickly.

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