Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) in Children With Severe Pneumonia

Pneumonia is the leading cause of childhood morbidity and death in many developing countries including Bangladesh, causing about 2 million deaths worldwide each year. Pneumonia is an infection of the lungs, most commonly caused by viruses or bacteria like Streptococcus pneumoniae and Haemophilus influenzae. Depending on the clinical presentation, pneumonia can be classified as very severe, severe or non-severe, with specific treatment for each of them except for antibiotic therapy. Severe and very severe pneumonia require hospitalization for additional supportive treatment such as suction, oxygen therapy and administration of bronchodilator. In Bangladesh, the number of hospital beds is inadequate for admission of all pneumonia cases that require hospitalization; however, it is also important to provide institutional care to those children who cannot be hospitalized due to bed constraints. Provision of appropriate antibiotics and supportive cares during the period of stay at established day-care centres could be an effective alternative. The impetus for this study came from the findings of our recently completed study titled "Daycare-based management of severe pneumonia in under-5 children when hospitalization is not possible due to the lack of beds". This study successfully managed children (n=251), but it was not a randomized trial and thus direct comparison of the efficacy of management of severe pneumonia at the day-care centre, essential for building confidence for implementing this management policy, is not possible. We, the researchers at the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh, could not plan a randomized, controlled trial (RCT) because of ethical reasons. Now that we have data suggesting effectiveness as well as safety of the day-care based treatment for management of children with severe pneumonia, a RCT should be possible. Two hundred fifty-one children with severe pneumonia were enrolled at the Radda Clinic from June 2003 to