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Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews

Clinical symptoms and signs for the diagnosis of Mycoplasma pneumoniae in children and adolescents with community‐acquired pneumonia

Overview of attention for article published in Cochrane database of systematic reviews, October 2012
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About this Attention Score

  • In the top 25% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (88th percentile)
  • Above-average Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age and source (56th percentile)

Mentioned by

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14 X users
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2 Facebook pages
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1 Wikipedia page

Citations

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78 Dimensions

Readers on

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288 Mendeley
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1 CiteULike
Title
Clinical symptoms and signs for the diagnosis of <i>Mycoplasma pneumoniae</i> in children and adolescents with community‐acquired pneumonia
Published in
Cochrane database of systematic reviews, October 2012
DOI 10.1002/14651858.cd009175.pub2
Pubmed ID
Authors

Kay Wang, Peter Gill, Rafael Perera, Anne Thomson, David Mant, Anthony Harnden

Abstract

Mycoplasma pneumoniae (M. pneumoniae) is a significant cause of community-acquired pneumonia in children and adolescents. Treatment with macrolide antibiotics is recommended. However, M. pneumoniae is difficult to diagnose based on clinical symptoms and signs. Diagnostic uncertainty can lead to inappropriate antibiotic prescribing, which may worsen clinical prognosis and increase antibiotic resistance. The objectives of this review are (i) to assess the diagnostic accuracy of symptoms and signs in the clinical recognition of M. pneumoniae in children and adolescents with community-acquired pneumonia; and (ii) to assess the influence of potential sources of heterogeneity on the diagnostic accuracy of symptoms and signs in the clinical recognition of M. pneumoniae. We searched MEDLINE (January 1950 to 26 June 2012) and EMBASE (January 1980 to 26 June 2012). We identified additional references by handsearching the reference lists of included articles and snowballing. We searched the reference lists of relevant systematic reviews identified by searching the Medion database, Database of Reviews of Effects 2012, Issue 6 (25 June 2012) and the Cochrane Register of Diagnostic Test Accuracy studies (2 July 2012). Experts in the field reviewed our list of included studies for any obvious omissions. We included peer-reviewed published studies which prospectively and consecutively recruited children with community-acquired pneumonia from any healthcare setting, confirmed the presence of M. pneumoniae using serology with or without other laboratory methods and reported data on clinical symptoms and signs in sufficient detail to construct 2 x 2 tables. One review author scanned titles to exclude obviously irrelevant articles. Two review authors independently scanned the remaining titles and abstracts, reviewed full-text versions of potentially relevant articles, assessed the quality of included articles and extracted data on study characteristics and the following clinical features: cough, wheeze, coryza, crepitations, fever, rhonchi, shortness of breath, chest pain, diarrhea, myalgia and headache.We calculated study-specific values for sensitivity, specificity and positive and negative likelihood ratios with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). We estimated the post-test probability of M. pneumoniae based on the absence or presence of symptoms and signs.We calculated pooled sensitivities, specificities, positive and negative likelihood ratios with 95% CIs for symptoms and signs where data were reported by at least four included studies by fitting a bivariate normal model for the logit transforms of sensitivity and specificity. We explored potential sources of heterogeneity by fitting bivariate models with covariates using multi-level mixed-effects logistic regression. We performed sensitivity analyses excluding data from studies for which we were concerned about the representativeness of the study population and/or the acceptability of the reference standard. Our search identified 8299 articles (excluding duplicates). We examined the titles and abstracts of 1125 articles and the full-text versions of 97 articles. We included seven studies in our review, which reported data from 1491 children; all were conducted in hospital settings. Overall, study quality was moderate. In two studies the presence of chest pain more than doubled the probability of M. pneumoniae. Wheeze was 12% more likely to be absent in children with M. pneumoniae (pooled positive likelihood ratio (LR+) 0.76, 95% CI 0.60 to 0.97; pooled negative likelihood ratio (LR-) 1.12, 95% CI 1.02 to 1.23). Our sensitivity analysis showed that the presence of crepitations was associated with M. pneumoniae, but this finding was of borderline statistical significance (pooled LR+ 1.10, 95% CI 0.99 to 1.23; pooled LR- 0.66, 95% CI 0.46 to 0.96). M. pneumoniae cannot be reliably diagnosed in children and adolescents with community-acquired pneumonia based on clinical symptoms and signs. Although the absence of wheeze is a statistically significant diagnostic indicator, it does not have sufficient diagnostic value to guide empirical macrolide treatment. Data from two studies suggest that the presence of chest pain more than doubles the probability of M. pneumoniae. However, further research is needed to substantiate this finding. More high quality large-scale studies in primary care settings are needed to help develop prediction rules based on epidemiological data as well as clinical and baseline patient characteristics.

X Demographics

X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 14 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 288 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Indonesia 1 <1%
Canada 1 <1%
Unknown 286 99%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Master 42 15%
Student > Bachelor 37 13%
Researcher 32 11%
Student > Postgraduate 20 7%
Other 19 7%
Other 59 20%
Unknown 79 27%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Medicine and Dentistry 124 43%
Nursing and Health Professions 25 9%
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology 6 2%
Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutical Science 6 2%
Social Sciences 5 2%
Other 30 10%
Unknown 92 32%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 12. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 28 June 2018.
All research outputs
#3,087,603
of 25,457,858 outputs
Outputs from Cochrane database of systematic reviews
#5,739
of 11,842 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#22,046
of 193,432 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Cochrane database of systematic reviews
#106
of 241 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 25,457,858 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done well and is in the 87th percentile: it's in the top 25% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 11,842 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 38.9. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 52% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 193,432 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done well, scoring higher than 88% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 241 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 56% of its contemporaries.