Digestive manifestations of Covid-19 in children: a retrospective study

Abstract

Background: The world is currently facing a pandemic due to a new species of the Coronaviridae family called SARS-CoV-2,discovered in the city of Wuhan in China in December 2019. The WHO has named the resulting disease COVID-19 (CoronavirusDisease 2019). It has been a global health problem due to its major socio-economic damage. The aim of this study was toshow the prevalence of gastrointestinal and hepatic manifestations in symptomatic children with COVID-19. Methods: We performed a retrospective study, including 36 symptomatic children infected by SARS-CoV-2 hospitalized at themother and child hospital of university hospital of Mohammed VI, Marrakech in Morocco, over a period of 7 months. Clinicaland biological manifestations of the digestive system were evaluated for all patients. Results: The digestive symptomatology came in second place after the respiratory manifestations. 14 patients (38.89 % ofsymptomatic patients) in our study had digestive symptoms on admission: 12 (33.33%) presented with diarrhea, 4 (11.11%) hadabdominal pain and only one child (2.78%) had vomiting. Aspartate aminotransferase (AST) was elevated in one patient, whilealanine transaminase (ALT) was elevated in 6 patients. The prothrombin level was normal in all patients. All patients were dischargedwith good general condition without morbidity and mortality. Conclusion: This study concludes with the high prevalence of digestive manifestations of COVID-19 in symptomatic children.There were no severe clinical or biological abnormalities in our study. Digestive manifestations during COVID-19 in childrenare frequent, which requires the awareness of health professionals Keywords: COVID-19; digestive manifestations; children.