Introduction: Acute respiratory distress is one of the most common pediatric emergencies. In fact, it is a very common symptom between a lot of diseases. Oxygen therapy remains the most important treatment of all causes of respiratory distress.
Aim of work: Evaluation the usefulness of non invasive continuous positive airway pressure (n CPAP) in conditions of respiratory distressed infants & children in comparison to conventional O2 therapy (nasal pronge, oxygen mask, venturi mask).
Patients and methods: the study was conducted on 100 infants and children between 1 month and 5 years old having nearly the same causes of respiratory distress in Bab El Shaerea University hospital. They were divided into two groups, group I (50 patients) treated by n CPAP, and group II (50 patients) treated by conventional O2 therapy, and evaluated after 48 hours by ABG and clinically using PRISM score, CRS score and asthma score.
Results of the study: showed that there was statistically significant improvement in ABG finding in group I more than group II after 48 hours of oxygen therapy. Also, duration of oxygen therapy and hospital stay was statistically significant less in group I. Clinically, the improvement in group I was more significant than group II. Asthma patients showed no difference in asthma score in both groups.
Conclusion: CPAP was associated with improved respiratory rate and decreased morbidity & mortality in children younger than 5 years with undifferentiated respiratory distress. There were fewer serious adverse events. CPAP was associated with more improvement in ABG finding, less hospital stay and shorter duration of O2 treatment than conventional O2 therapy.
Recommendations: more studies should be done on asthmatic patients to identify if there is an upper hand of CPAP over conventional O2 therapy in asthma treatment.