Children with Chest Pain Visiting the Emergency Department

Background

Chest pain is a common complaint in children visiting the emergency department (ED). True organic problems like cardiac disease are rare. We assess and analyze the etiology of chest pain among children visiting a pediatric ED in one medical center.

Methods

We retrospectively reviewed the medical records of children with chest pain who visited our ED between September 2002 and June 2005. Any case of trauma-associated chest pain was excluded from this study.

Results

A total of 103 patients (64 boys, 39 girls; mean age, 13 years; age range, 4–17 years) were enrolled into this study; 101 patients had chest radiograms (98.1%). Pneumonia was identified in five patients and pneumothorax in three. Eighty-seven patients had electrocardiogram study (84.5%) and four of them showed abnormalities. Additional diagnostic tests were performed in 64 patients (62.1%), including complete blood count analysis and echocardiography. Echocardiograms were performed in 15 (14.6%) patients. Six of them showed minor abnormality. Panendoscopy was done in six (5.8%) patients, and gastroesophageal reflux was found in three. Eleven (10.7%) patients were admitted to hospital because of pneumonia, pneumothorax or arrhythmia. Overall, idiopathic chest pain was the most common diagnosis (59.2%). Other associated disorders were pulmonary (24.3%), musculoskeletal (6.7%), gastrointestinal (5.8%), cardiac (2.0%) and miscellaneous (2.0%).

Conclusion

The most common cause of chest pain prompting a child to visit the ED is idiopathic chest pain. Careful physical examination can reveal important clues and save much unnecessary examinations.

KEY WORDS:  chest pain , children , emergency department

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