الفهرس 
IntroductionOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Bacterial meningitis (BM) is a severe infection of the central nervoussystem which occurs especially in children 5 years of age. Although the occurrence of negative consequences of BM in developed countries is strongly reduced by vaccination strategies, antibiotic treatment and good care facilities, BM is still responsible for substantial morbidity and mortality in both developing and developed countries and so our study was done to identify the etiology of meningitis cases in Shebein Elkom fever hospital, describe the epidemiological characteristics of each type of meningitis and to be aware of early symptoms and signs for early detection and proper management. The study was designed to include all patients clinically suspected to have meningitis and admitted to Shebein Elkom fever hospital (from 1 month to 15 years old) in the time period from 1st of January 2011 to 31st of December 2011 and the children (total number 132) were divided into 3 groups according to age Group A (GA) : Infants from one month to one year (N=62;36 boys, 26 girls), Group B (GB) : Preschool age ; from one year to 5 years (N=30;15 boys, 15 girls) and Group C (GC) : School age ; from 5 years to 15 years (N=40;23 boys, 17 girls)We took the following data from parents and relatives : a) Epidemiological data : age, gender, place of residence, occupation of the mother, onset date, admission date and prior antibiotic treatment. b) Clinical data : presence of the following manifestations on admission(fever, seizures, nausea/vomiting, headache, skin rash or lesion , stiff neck, bulging fontanel in infants less than one year old). 103 All patients were subjected to the following investigations after complete clinical examination and assessment : 1- Complete blood count (CBC)2- CSF analysis (chemical, cytological) and CSF culture. 3- Chest X-ray, to check for lung infection. In our study the main causative organisms were N. meningitides, H. influenzae and S. pneumoniae. We noted in the study that, there was significant association between the age of the patients and the type of isolated organism, as the relative frequencies of the different bacterial species causing acute bacterial meningitis differed among infants, preschool, and school aged children. In the current study in infants less than one year, H. influenzae was the leading cause of bacterial meningitis resulting in 7/18 (38.9%) of cases in this age group As regards meningitis due to H. influenzae we found 7/9 (77.7%) were below one year The second most common organism below one year age was pneumococci 6/18 (33.3%) and N. meningitides 5/18 (27.8%). This is again could be attributed to vaccination of school children against meningococcal meningitis starting in 1980s which might have lead to decreased number of meningococcal meningitis cases and consequently of bacterial meningitis in general in this age group and leaving S. pneumoniae to be the most frequent organism causing bacterial.