ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Physiol.
Sec. Gastrointestinal Sciences
Clinical Application of Capsule Endoscopy in Children with Small Bowel Disease in Wuhan, China
Provisionally accepted
wei su1*
Pingping Xu1
Dan Luo1Baoxiang Wang1Yingru Liu2Siyue Tang1Shan Guo1Zhi Yu1Leyong Zheng1Jie Feng1Huifen Huang1Yuan Gao1
Fang Wang1- 1Precision Medical Center, Wuhan Children's Hospital, Wuhan, China
- 2Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
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Objective: To evaluate the clinical application value of capsule endoscopy (CE) in the diagnosis of small intestinal diseases in children in Wuhan. Methods: A retrospective analysis was conducted on the clinical data of children who underwent CE examination at the Digestive Endoscopy Center of Wuhan Children's Hospital from July 2021 to November 2024. The completion rate of CE examination, disease detection rate, small intestinal transit time, and adverse reactions were analyzed. Results: Among the 151 children, 97 were male (64.24%) and 54 were female (35.76%), with an average age of 10.9 years. CE was swallowed orally in 133 cases (88.08%) and placed through gastroscopy in 18 cases (11.92%). Complete small intestinal examination was achieved in 144 cases (95.36%), with an average small intestinal transit time of 4 hours and 11 minutes for those swallowed orally and 4 hours and 16 minutes for those placed through gastroscopy. Seven cases (4.64%) did not complete the full small intestinal examination. Abdominal pain (99 cases, 65.56%), anemia (19 cases, 12.58%), and hematochezia and melena (23 cases, 15.23%) were the most common indications for examination. Among the 151 children, 116 (76.82%) had positive results, including 68 cases of nonspecific small intestinal inflammation, 29 cases of Crohn's disease, 4 cases of Henoch-Schönlein purpura, 6 cases of Meckel's diverticulum, 4 cases of small intestinal parasitic disease, 2 cases of collagenous gastritis, 1 case of melanocytic polyp, 1 case of lymphangiectasia, and 1 case of blue rubber bleb nevus syndrome. Nonspecific small intestinal inflammation was the most common in all age groups, while Crohn's disease was mainly seen in the 7-12 years and 13-18 years age groups, accounting for 55.17% and 44.83%, respectively. No adverse reactions occurred in all children. Conclusion: CE examination in children in Wuhan has a high disease detection rate and good safety. CE can be further promoted in the diagnosis and treatment of small intestinal diseases in children.
Keywords: Capsule Endoscopy, Children, clinical application, Pediatric CE, Small intestinal diseases
Received: 27 Sep 2025; Accepted: 08 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 su, Xu, Luo, Wang, Liu, Tang, Guo, Yu, Zheng, Feng, Huang, Gao and Wang. 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: wei su
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