ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Cell. Infect. Microbiol.
Sec. Clinical and Diagnostic Microbiology and Immunology
Volume 15 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2025.1652949
Targeted next-generation sequencing for pediatric lower respiratory tract infections: A retrospective study
Provisionally accepted
- Maternal and Child Health Hospital of Guangxi Zhua, Nanning, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Objectives: Lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs), including bronchitis and pneumonia, are common pediatric conditions. Accurate and timely pathogen identification is essential in this population, with targeted next-generation sequencing (tNGS) significantly improving detection rates. This study aimed to systematically assess the clinical utility of tNGS in identifying pathogens in pediatric LRTIs.Methods: A retrospective analysis of 107 pediatric patients with lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs) was conducted between January 2024 and December 2024. The concordance of tNGS, quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR), and microbial culture results with clinical diagnoses was assessed.Data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), with statistical significance set at P < 0.05.Of the 107 pediatric patients, 34 (31.8%) had single-pathogen infections while 73 (68.2%) had multiple infections, with bacterial-viral co-infections comprising 42.5% of the latter group. The tNGS results demonstrated a concordance rate of over 66% with clinical diagnoses, which was significantly higher (P < 0.001) than that of qPCR and culture. The analysis revealed 80% concordance between tNGS and qPCR results. Notably, tNGS demonstrated 90% concordance with culture methods in approximately 70% of comparative detections. Furthermore, for Human rhinovirus and Mycoplasma pneumoniae, the RPM values for tNGS were significantly higher (P<0.05) in (tNGS+qPCR+) samples than in (tNGS+qPCR-) samples. Compared with Human rhinovirus (AUC=0.759), Mycoplasma pneumoniae exhibited stronger discriminatory power (AUC=0.917).The tNGS results demonstrated high concordance with the clinical diagnosis, supporting its high applicability in diagnosing pathogens in pediatric patients with severe, mixed, or refractory infections.
Keywords: pediatric, Lower respiratory tract infections, Bacterial culture, qPCR, TNGS
Received: 24 Jun 2025; Accepted: 05 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Li, Guo, Chen, Zhao, Liang and Liu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Linlin Li, Maternal and Child Health Hospital of Guangxi Zhua, Nanning, China
Minxue Liu, Maternal and Child Health Hospital of Guangxi Zhua, Nanning, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.