Misclassification of malaria as pneumonia in children in sub-Saharan Africa.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The World Health Organization (WHO) clinical case definitions for pneumonia were designed to prioritize sensitivity over specificity. In sub-Saharan Africa, the disease that is most likely to be misclassified as pneumonia is Plasmodium falciparum malaria.

Methods

By using chest X-ray positivity as an indicator for pneumonia, we estimated the extent of pneumonia misclassification due to malaria in the Pneumonia Etiology Research for Child Health (PERCH) study. Additionally, we developed a simple model to predict the proportion of pneumonia cases as defined by the WHO that could be attributed to malaria in settings with varying levels of malaria parasitaemia prevalence.

Results

In the PERCH study, the prevalence of malaria parasitaemia was low (4.7% among WHO

SUBMITTER: Bottomley C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11984459 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature