Quality of Life Measures for Iraqi Children’s Patients with Covid-19

Abstract

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has had a major impact on public health in particular and on the survival rate in general.

Objective: This study aimed to assess children's quality of life during COVID-19.

Patients and methods: A prospective study was conducted on paediatric patients infected with Covid-19, aged between 2 and 15 years, in different hospitals in Iraq, from July 17, 2022, to March 15, 2023. The study assessed the patients' general health by comparing their quality of life before and during COVID-19 using the ED-EQ scale. It also evaluated the survival rate of paediatric patients during Covid-19, using the Kaplan-Meier survival scale.

Results: The results showed data for pediatric patients infected with COVID-19, indicating that patients in the age group (12-15) years recorded the highest infection rate, with 50 cases, with the percentage of males reaching 64 cases and females 38 cases. The most common symptoms were accompanied by fever in 21 patients and diarrhea in 19 patients. The clinical outcomes recorded that the dependent parameters in patients' health decreased during COVID-19 compared to before COVID-19, and they were general health factor (65.35 ± 7.8), physical factor (67.82 ± 9.2), and school interaction (54.20 ± 8.9). This is the most common of these findings. Moreover, these results recorded the 70-day survival rate of pediatric patients during and after COVID-19, as the survival rates were significantly lower during the period between days ten and day 60 compared to post-COVID-19.

Conclusion: Although COVID-19 appears to be less frequent in children than in adults, it has a detrimental impact on children's quality of life, posing considerable physical, psychological, as well as mental health on children.