Cystic Fibrosis Diagnosed Using Indigenously Wrapped Sweating Technique: First Large-Scale Study Reporting Socio-Demographic, Clinical, and Laboratory Features among the Children in Bangladesh A Lower Middle Income Country

• Main Authors: ARM Luthful Kabir MBBS, FCPS (Author), Sudipta Roy MBBS, FCPS (Author), Rahat Bin Habib MBBS, MD (Author), Kazi Selim Anwar MD, MPhil (Author), Md. Abid Hossain Mollah MBBS, FCPS, Dip. in Med Edu, FRCP (Author), Ruhul Amin MBBS, FCPS (Author), Al Amin Mridha MBBS, MD, FCPS, FRCP (Author), Jasim Uddin Majumder MBBS, MD, FCPS (Author), Md. Delwar Hossain MBBS, FCPS (Author), Nazmul Haque MPhil (Author), Shakil Ahmed MBBS, MD, FCPS (Author), Mohammod Jobayer Chisti MBBS, MMed, PhD (Author)
• Format: Book
• Published: SAGE Publishing, 2020-10-01T00:00:00Z.
• Subjects: article
• Online Access: Connect to this object online.

Summary

Due to lack of robust data on childhood cystic fibrosis (CF) in Bangladesh we sought to evaluate their clinico-epidemiology. A cross-sectional observation was conducted adopting CF-foundation consensus-panel-diagnostic criteria in 3 tertiary-care-hospitals in Bangladesh from 2000 to 2017. Clinically suspected 95 CF-cases were subjected to sweat-chloride testing using locally-developed a fast, cheap and effective indigenously body-wrapped sweating technique measured by US-Easy Lyte-automated microprocessor-controlled analyzer marking ≥60 mmol/L as positive. Mean-age of CF-cases at disease-onset was 16.9 ± 26.6 months that significantly differed with age-at-diagnosis ( P  < .02). Pulmonary syndromes included chronic wet cough in 100%, respiratory distress in 90.5%, digital-clubbing in 78%, mucopurulent-sputum in 74%-cases, and crepitation in 82%. Radio-imaging revealed bronchiectasis in 60%, hyperinflation/peribronchial-thickening in 22% and, pan-sinusitis in 89%-cases. While 37% had history-of malabsorption, high-fecal-fat revealed in 53%-cases. Malnutrition prevailed as severe-underweight in 87%-cases and all CF-cases (100%) had high sweat-chloride (mean = 118 ± 53.34 mmol/L). Thus, children with pulmonary features coupled with severe malnutrition and associated radio-imaging bronchiectasis should be screened for CF with a fast, cheap and effective sweat test in resource poor settings.

Item Description

2333-794X
10.1177/2333794X20967585