Major ArticleInfectious disease in pediatric out-of-home child care
Section snippets
Epidemiology
Numerous factors affect the epidemiology of infections within child care centers. Infections that are brought into the child care center come from the community. Understanding the epidemiology of infectious illnesses within a community, particularly respiratory and gastrointestinal viruses, can assist in predicting transmission within a child care facility. The size of the facility also impacts on the frequency of transmission of infectious diseases. The larger the size of the center, the
Respiratory tract infections
Acute upper and lower respiratory tract infections are the most frequent illnesses occurring in children, irrespective of attendance in a child care center. Children followed at the Frank Porter Graham Day Care Center29 at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill experienced an average of 6.5 respiratory illnesses per year. However, the frequency of infections was highly age dependent. The highest rate of infection occurred in the second 6 months of life (7-12 months of age). During this
Infection control measures
Measures designed to reduce transmission of infectious diseases within day care facilities need to be developed in the context of the goals of these facilities. Unlike hospitals, there is a much greater expectation for person-to-person contact within a child care center. This interaction is essential for normal growth and development of these young children. Therefore, restrictions designed to reduce transmission of infectious diseases might hinder efforts to enhance social development.
The
Conclusion
Child care centers provide an essential service to many families around the world. Over the last few decades, the number of children in out-of-home care has increased. This trend is likely to continue in the future. Therefore, providing a safe and healthy environment in a child care facility may have a significant impact on the health and well being of millions of children. Many efforts needed to reduce transmission of infections within a child care facility require only the use of common
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Spatiotemporal variations of microbial assembly, interaction, and potential risk in urban dust
2022, Environment InternationalCitation Excerpt :The gathering would increase the threat to children health. Previous studies have reported a higher incidence of certain diseases (Brady 2005; Thacker et al. 1992) for children who attend daycare centers compared to those cared for at home. The transmission of pathogenic microbes via air (Herfst et al. 2012; Roy and Milton 2004; Hui et al., 2019; Roslund et al., 2021) would increase the risk for developing an infection disease, e.g., respiratory and dermatologic illnesses, so the dust/air in the kindergartens represents a unique opportunity for assessing the potential risk of microbes for children health.
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2022, American Journal of Emergency MedicineIllness-related absence among preschool children: Insights from a health intervention in Swedish preschools
2017, Journal of Health EconomicsCitation Excerpt :We find some suggestive evidence that the intervention may have induced effects operating in different directions: while improved hygiene practices may have reduced illness, stricter guidelines regarding absence during infections may have contributed to an increased absence level, resulting in an overall zero effect. There are several previous studies of hygiene interventions at childcare centers, most of which are based on small-scale randomized control trials with monitored compliance of the stricter hygiene practices (see e.g. Willmott et al., 2016; Brady 2005; and Huskins 2000 for reviews). As for the intervention studied here, previous hygiene interventions have often had a clear focus on improved hand hygiene.
Children's physiological responses to childcare
2017, Current Opinion in PsychologyCitation Excerpt :Recently, we [28] showed that sIgA was not associated with type of care, but lower caregiver sensitivity was associated with lower sIgA levels in both childcare homes and centers. This downregulating effect of low-quality childcare might partly explain why children attending childcare more often have common infectious diseases than children who stay at home [29–31]. Because of country-dependent regulations there exists large variety across countries in childcare quality [32] and attendance.