Etiological Features of Vomiting in Infants

Abstract Introduction: Vomiting is one of the most common symptoms in children and a common reason for seeing a doctor. The causes are very numerous and unusually diverse, but in most cases, vomiting is of organic origin. Objective: This paper is a retrospective case study - control, performed in the Pediatric Clinic of Spitalul Clinic Judeţean Constanţa, which aims to evaluate the clinical and etiological aspects of vomiting in infants. Material and method: The statistical study was performed over a period of 6 months (January 1st, 2019 - June 30th, 2019), on a group of 1091 infants selected from a total number of 3943 children hospitalized during this period in the Pediatric Clinic. The patients in the study group ranged in age from 0 to 12 months. The data were extracted from the patient observation sheets in the archives of the Pediatrics Department. Results and discussions: The retrospective study carried out resulted in the following important aspects related to the etiological particularities of vomiting. Of the total number of infants admitted during the study period, vomiting was a symptom in 29.60% of cases.The analysis of the study revealed the predominance of organic etiology (79.57%), with clear predominance in newborns and infants of cases of vomiting with organic etiology (79.56%). Cases of vomiting with functional etiology occurred in the newborn and infant are represented by eating errors.Within the organic etiology, the digestive pathology predominates, accumulating a percentage of 53.86% of the total cases of vomiting occurred at this age. Of the diseases with extradigestive organic etiology, most were represented by respiratory diseases and ORL. The functional etiology registered a percentage of 20.43%, this predominating in infants, age group 7 - 11 months. Conclusions: The idea that emerges from the study is that infants with vomiting are in large numbers and have a very varied etiology, so is necessary to apply a clear investigation algorithm, with the correct establishment of the diagnosis in each case, which leads to the best therapeutic conduct.