ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Pediatr.
Sec. Pediatric Pulmonology
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fped.2025.1556349
Semiquantitative Chest Computed Tomography scoring system to estimate severity in pediatric community-acquired pneumonia
Provisionally accepted
- Guangzhou Women and Children’s Medical Center, Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, China
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A study assessed the utility of semiquantitative chest Computed tomography (CT) for diagnosing and determining the severity of community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) in children. The study was conducted retrospectively on patients with CAP from Jan. 2019 to Dec. 2023. The semiquantitative chest CT scoring system was used based on lung inflammatory lesions and hydrothorax extent. The inter-rater reliability between two observers was assessed. The score was then correlated with laboratory results, identified pathogens, and patient prognosis. Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis was employed to evaluate the diagnostic accuracy of the score for identifying severe cases. The study included 426 patients, with 186 severe cases (43.66%). The intragroup correlation coefficient (ICC) value of the two observers was 0.957 (95% CI 0.944-0.970). The results showed a positive correlation between chest CT scores and neutrophil percentage, neutrophil counts, C-reaction protein, procalcitonin, lactate dehydrogenase and fibrinogen levels, and a negative correlation between the score with lymphocyte counts, hemoglobin and albumin levels (P<0.001). Patients with coinfection had higher scores than those with single infections(P<0.05). There was a positive relationship between the score and fever duration and length of stay y(P<0.001). The area under the curve (AUC) of chest CT score for diagnosing severe cases was 0.805. A score cutoff of >3 had 64.52% sensitivity and 84.17% specificity. Conclusion: It is practicable and effective that semiquantitative chest CT scoring system be measured for estimating condition and evaluating prognosis of pediatric CAP.
Keywords: Community-acquired pneumonia, Computer tomography, semiquantitative evaluation, score, Children
Received: 09 Jan 2025; Accepted: 14 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Fan, XU, Dai, Yang, Zeng, Zeng and Lu. 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: Gen Lu, Guangzhou Women and Children’s Medical Center, Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, China
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