ArticleThe Pediatric infectious disease journal2020
Epidemiology and Etiology of Severe Childhood Encephalitis in The Netherlands.
Article in The Pediatric infectious disease journal, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 20 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
20 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- A systematic review of the epidemiology of pediatric autoimmune encephalitis: disease burden and clinical decision-making.Frontiers in neurology · 2024Pooled it
- Intravenous immunoglobulin treatment in childhood encephalitis (IgNiTE): a randomised controlled trial.BMJ open · 2023Trial
- Burden of Encephalitis in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: 1990-2023.Neuroepidemiology · 2026Article
- Etiological spectrum, risk factors, and outcomes of pediatric acute encephalitis: a 17-year pediatric intensive care unit retrospective cohort study.BMC pediatrics · 2026Article
- Presumed parasitic meningoencephalitis following fresh snail exposure: physiotherapy interventions and functional outcomes in two distinct families and one solo case.BMC neurology · 2026Article
- Lumbar puncture use and antibiotic treatment in newly admitted febrile children following index cases of invasive infections.BMC infectious diseases · 2026Article
- The evaluation value of disturbance coefficient combined with bedside continuous video electroencephalogram for the short-term prognosis of severe encephalitis in children.BMC pediatrics · 2026Article
- Nationwide Analysis of In-Hospital Mortality in Patients with Encephalitis-Related Diagnoses in Ecuador.Diseases (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Clinical characteristics and exploratory factors associated with in-hospital mortality in pediatric severe viral encephalitis.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2026Article
- Evaluation of Pediatric Patients Diagnosed with Encephalitis: Single Center Experience.Sisli Etfal Hastanesi tip bulteni · 2026Article
- Changes in etiology, diagnostic challenges, and prognostic factors in pediatric acute encephalitis: Insights from an 18-year retrospective study.Neurological sciences : official journal of the Italian Neurological Society and of the Italian Society of Clinical Neurophysiology · 2025Article
- Trends in Paediatric Viral Meningitis and Encephalitis With Unconfirmed Aetiology: A Spanish Population-Based Study, 2016-2020.Acta paediatrica (Oslo, Norway : 1992) · 2025Article
- Pediatric non-congenital central nervous system infections: role of imaging in the emergency department.Pediatric radiology · 2025Review
- Article
- Article
- The Worldwide Prevalence of Herpes Simplex Virus Encephalitis and Meningitis: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Turkish archives of pediatrics · 2023Article
- Detection of HSV-1, HSV-2 and VZV Isolated from Cerebrospinal Fluid Samples of Children Suspected to Encephalitis.Advanced biomedical research · 2023Article
- Infections in the Developing Brain: The Role of the Neuro-Immune Axis.Frontiers in neurology · 2022Review
- Neurotropic Astroviruses in Animals.Viruses · 2021Review
- The Causes and Long-Term Consequences of Viral Encephalitis.Frontiers in cellular neuroscience · 2021Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 5 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundLimited data are available on childhood encephalitis. Our study aimed to increase insight on clinical presentation, etiology, and clinical outcome of children with severe encephalitis in the Netherlands.
methodsWe identified patients through the Dutch Pediatric Intensive Care Evaluation database and included children diagnosed with encephalitis <18 years of age admitted to 1 of the 8 pediatric intensive care units (PICU) in the Netherlands between January 2003 and December 2013. We analyzed demographic characteristics, clinical symptoms, neurologic imaging, etiology, treatment and mortality.
resultsWe included 121 children with a median age of 4.6 years (IQR 1.3-9.8). The most frequently described clinical features were headache (82.1%), decreased consciousness (79.8%) and seizures (69.8%). In 44.6% of the children, no causative agent was identified. Viral- and immune-mediated encephalitis were diagnosed in 33.1% and 10.7% of the patients. A herpes simplex virus infection (13.2%) was mainly seen in children <5 years of age, median age, 1.73 years (IQR 0.77-5.01), while immune-mediated encephalitis mostly affected older children, median age of 10.4 years (IQR, 3.72-14.18). An age of ≥ 5 years at initial presentation was associated with a lower mortality (OR 0.2 [CI 0.08-0.78]). The detection of a bacterial (OR 9.4 [CI 2.18-40.46]) or viral (OR 3.7 [CI 1.16-11.73]) pathogen was associated with a higher mortality.
conclusionsIn almost half of the Dutch children presenting with severe encephalitis, a causative pathogen could not be identified, underlining the need for enhancement of microbiologic diagnostics. The detection of a bacterial or viral pathogen was associated with a higher mortality.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.