Perfil epidemiológico de pacientes hospitalizados acometidos por infecções virais agudas do sistema nervoso central

Abstract

The Acute Viral Infections of the Central Nervous System (AVICNS) are important causes of hospitalization. In general, they can be subdivided into Encephalitis, Meningitis and Myelitis, when they affect segments of the Central Nervous System separately, and Meningoencephalitis and Encephalomyelitis, when segments are associated. The objective of this research was to verify the prevalence and incidence of AVICNS in hospitalized patients and to describe their clinical-epidemiological profile. This is a cross-sectional and descriptive study, carried out in a tertiary hospital, with data collection from medical records. The sample was non-probabilistic, selected by convenience, and included all patients who were hospitalized with the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) codes corresponding to AVICNS between January 1, 2016 to December 31, 2020. Descriptive analysis was performed with the calculation of measures of central tendency, measures of dispersion, and the distribution of absolute and relative frequencies. The sample of AVICNS was 81 patients, and the highest incidence of these was in the year 2016, with 112.0 cases/100,000 hospitalized patients, and the lowest was in the year 2018, with 51.3 cases/100,000 hospitalized patients. Among the AVICNS, Viral Meningitis was the most prevalent (40.8%), as was the male population (58.0%), white color (98.7%), and young adult age group (39.5%). Headache was the most prevalent symptom (67.9%) of AVICNS. We conclude that the incidence of AVICNS has increased in the last 5 years and that the tendency is to decrease with diagnostic and therapeutic advances.