ABSTRACT

Introduction: Seizure caused by fever is the most common form of convulsion in children and usually has a good prognosis. Because Incidence of convulsion in children is a worrying experience for parents, identifying risk factors and planning for the prevention of seizure recurrence is very important. The purpose of this study was to determine the characteristics of febrile convulsion in children admitted to Pediatric Hospital of Bandar Abbas in 2010.

Methods: This retrospective cross-sectional study was performed on 222 children hospitalized for febrile convulsion from March to February 2010. The instrument was a questionnaire containing demographic data and causes and characteristics of seizures completed from patients records. Data analysis was performed using SPSS 16, chi square and ANOVA.

Results: Findings showed that most of the children were male (143) and in the age range of 1-2 years. 18.2 percent (40 cases) had history of using anti convulsion drugs. Most of  febrile convulsion (45.9 percent, 102 cases) was caused by fever of unknown origin. The other causes included: upper respiratory infections (28.8 percent, 64 cases), gastroenteritis (21.6 percent, 48 cases), and urinary tract infections (3.6 percent, 8 cases). In 28.3% of cases seizure took place in less than one hour from the beginning of fever. Most of convulsions (69.4%) occurred in temperature more than 38.7 ⁰C. Only in 3% of samples, convulsion occurence was without fever. Seizure duration in most cases (64.1percent, 142cases) was reported to be less than 5 minutes. Types of seizures in most cases,     (80.1 percent, 178 cases) were reported as generalized tonic colonic.

Conclusion: In this study, most cases of seizure occurred with fever of unknown origin. Therefore timely and appropriate temperature control in children after viral and bacterial infections can have an important role in reducing the incidence of febrile convulsion and its complications.