ArticleArchives of disease in childhood2023
Can I go home now? The safety and efficacy of a new UK paediatric febrile neutropenia protocol for risk-stratified early discharge on oral antibiotics.
Article in Archives of disease in childhood, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 3 papers.
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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.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Early Discontinuation of Empiric Antibiotic Therapy in Children with Cancer and Febrile Neutropenia: A Narrative Review.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2026Review
- Clinical Decision Support to Reduce Hospital Length-of-Stay for Cancer Patients with Fever and Neutropenia.Applied clinical informatics · 2025Article
- Prevention and Management of Infectious Complications in Pediatric Patients With Cancer: A Survey Assessment of Current Practices Across Children's Oncology Group Institutions.Pediatric blood & cancer · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issuedCorrection:2023
Authors and funding
11 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveTo evaluate a new protocol of risk stratification and early discharge for children with febrile neutropenia (FN).
designProspective service evaluation from 17 April 2020 to 16 April 2021.
setting13 specialist centres in the UK. PATIENTS: 405 children presenting with FN.
interventionAll children received intravenous antibiotics at presentation. Risk stratification was determined using the Australian-UK-Swiss (AUS) rule and eligibility for homecare assessed using criteria including disease, chemotherapy, presenting features and social factors. Those eligible for homecare could be discharged on oral antibiotics after a period of observation proportional to their risk group.
main outcome measuresMedian duration of admission and of intravenous antibiotics, and percentage of patients with positive blood cultures, significant infection, readmission within 7 days of initial presentation, intensive care unit (ICU) admission, death from infection and death from other causes.
results13 centres contributed 729 initial presentations of 405 patients. AUS rule scores were positively correlated with positive blood cultures, significant infection, ICU admission and death. 20% of children were eligible for homecare with oral antibiotics, of which 55% were low risk (AUS 0-1). 46% low-risk homecare eligible patients were discharged by 24 hours vs 2% homecare ineligible. Homecare readmission rates were 14% overall and 16% for low-risk cases (similar to a meta-analysis of previous studies). No child eligible for homecare was admitted to ICU or died.
conclusionsUse of the AUS rule and homecare criteria allow for safe early outpatient management of children with FN.
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