# Acute kidney injury: a post-COVID-19 complication in children and adolescents

## TL;DR

This study examines acute kidney injury in children with COVID-19, finding it is a severe complication linked to comorbidities and intensive care needs.

## Contribution

The paper reports on AKI in pediatric COVID-19 cases, highlighting clinical features and outcomes in a specific patient cohort.

## Key findings

- Male children were significantly more affected by AKI (62.5%) compared to females.
- All patients with AKI required ICU admission, and 22.5% of cases resulted in death.
- Most patients had comorbidities like epilepsy, cerebral palsy, and heart disease.

## Abstract

To describe cases of acute kidney injury (AKI) in children diagnosed with COVID-19, associated risk factors, clinical aspects and outcome of cases.

Retrospective study, carried out in a pediatric hospital between March 2020 and September 2021, with patients with COVID-19 who were diagnosed with AKI, studying information present in medical records such as comorbidities, age, gender and use of nephrotoxic medications.

We studied 40 cases, and male individuals were significantly more affected (62.5%; p=0.025). AKI was a severe complication of COVID-19 infection, with 100% of the sample requiring admission to the Intensive Care Unit and 22.5% dying. The most prevalent comorbidities analyzed in this study were epilepsy, cerebral palsy and heart disease. Most patients were classified according to Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) criteria as KDIGO 1 (42.5%), and required orotracheal intubation (67.5%). The frequency of use of nephrotoxic medications and need for dialysis was low, with percentages of 35 and 17.5%, respectively. Among the children who died, 70.4% had some comorbidity and 88.8% received invasive ventilation.

AKI in children with COVID-19 infection is associated with severe conditions. Despite the severity, most patients were discharged alive from the hospital.