Clinical and Demographic Features of 195 Pediatric Patients with Henoch-Schönlein Purpura, 12-Year Single Center Experience in Shiraz

Background: Henoch-Schönlein purpura (HSP) is one of the most common systemic types of vasculitis in children. Although it is a self-limited disease, life-threatening complications such as nephritis may occur. Early diagnosis and follow up might improve the long term outcome in renal involvement. There are few studies that have evaluated HSP in Iran. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to investigate demographic, laboratory data and clinical presentations of admitted HSP patients in a tertiary referral center, over a twelve-year period. Methods: This retrospective descriptive study evaluated 195 patients, diagnosed with HSP, who were admitted to Namazi Hospital in southwest of Iran (2006 - 2018). Demographic, clinical and laboratory findings, as well as treatment outcome of HSP patients were collected. Results: There were 118 males and 77 females with the mean age of 6.7 ± 3.21 years. About 70 (36%) patients showed common cold symptoms two weeks before HSP presentations. Admission course was 1 - 17 days (mean 4.55 ± 2.83) and autumn was recorded with the highest number of admitted patients (44.1%). In the course of hospitalization, 100% of the patients presented with palpable purpura, 61.02% with joint pain and 19.49% with abdominal pain. Moreover, 17.95% of the patients were noted with renal involve-ment. Laboratory data shows that more than half of patients (54%) had leukocytosis, only 9% of patients had positive CRP but all the patients had high erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR). Total of 43.1% of the patients received corticosteroids. Conclusions: The observed number of male patients with HSP was higher than females and the highest frequency of the HSP cases was observed in autumn. Joint pain and abdominal pain were the predominant clinical presentations, following skin purpura. The presented data can help with further HSP diagnosis and treatment plan.