Risk factors for first attack of febrile convulsion : case control study

الملخص EN

Background : Febrile seizures are the most common cause of convulsions in children.

Most are simple in nature, although those with focal type, prolonged duration more than (15 min) or those that recur within 24 hours or within the same febrile illness are considered complex.

Objective : This is case- control study was carried out to : -Analyze the risk factors associated with first febrile convulsion in comparison to control group of the same age.

Analyze the risk factors associated with complex febrile comvulsions.

Subjects and Methods: Patients : A case –control study had been done at Basrah peadiatric teaching hospital in pediatric medical department on 115 patients admitted with first attack of convulsion and fever, their ages ranged from six months to six years.

They had been admitted during the time from January2015 to the end of August 2015.

Sixty - nine were males and 46 were females.

Cases were matched with control group of 130 children without fever or fit in relation to age (6 months -6 years).

Results: The significant risk factors were positive family history of febrile convulsion P-value < 0.001, positive family history of developmental delay P-value < 0.01& patient s, history of preterm gestational age P-value < 0.01.

Other risk factors were not found to be significantly correlated with first febrile convulsion.

The study has revealed that there is a significant correlation between first complex febrile convulsion and young age of patients (≤15 months), P-value < 0.05.

The common infections leading to febrile convulsions were upper respiratory infections (40 % of the all causes), which was significantly associated with simple febrile convulsions.

Conclusoin: From this study three risk factors for first attack febrile seizure were identified, which may help in the prevention include positive history of febrile seizures in the family and developmental delay and history of the prematurity.

Complex type was found in 49.6 % of patients with febrile seizure and was related to young age ( ≤ 15 months).

Upper respiratory tract infections were the most common factor related to increase temperture in children with febrile convulsion & related to the simple type of febrile convulsions.