Abstract

VELASQUEZ-ESPIRITU, María; SALVADOR-ARTICA, Jorge; HERNANDEZ, Herminio  and  HERNANDEZ-DIAZ, Roger. Validity of maternal palpation in the detection of fever in children under 36 months. Rev Med Hered [online]. 2010, vol.21, n.4, pp.175-179. ISSN 1018-130X.

Objective: To determine how valid is the maternal palpation as a screening method to determine the presence or absence of fever in children. Material and methods: We selected for convenience 269 mothers and their children under 36 months, who attended the Pediatric Emergency Service of Hospital Nacional Cayetano Heredia for any complaint. Then, we asked the mothers if their child had fever or not (detected by palpation), and then we proceeded with the rectal temperature measurement of each child. Results: We included 269 participants. The maternal palpation for the detection of fever had a sensitivity of 79% (69.6% to 86.5%), specificity 91.7% (86.8% to 94.9%), PPV 82.1% (72.6% to 88.9%) and NPV 90.3% (85.1% to 93.8%); the positive likelihood ratio was 9.62 (5.86 to 15.81) and the negative likelihood ratio was 0.23 (0.15 to 0.34). The correlation (Kappa index) of fever or absence of fever determinated for the mother and thermometer was 0.72 (p:0.0000). Conclusions: Mothers have a well accuracy in determining the presence or absence of fever by palpation, therefore detection of fever by palpation is an efficient screening method. (Rev Med Hered 2010;21:175-179)

Keywords : Fever; maternal palpation; children.

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