Retrospective Review of Flexible Bronchoscopy in Pediatric Cancer Patients

• DOI: 10.3389/fonc.2021.770523
• Publication Date: 2021-12-14T05:10:40Z
• Authors: Ali H. Ahmad; Brandon D. Brown; Clark R. Andersen; Kris M. Mahadeo; Demetrios Petropo...; José A. Cortes; Shehla Razvi; Mary Katherine Ga...; Linette J. Ewing; Rodrigo E. Mejia
• Keywords: Flexible bronchoscopy; Pediatric cancer

The use of flexible bronchoscopy (FB) with bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) to diagnose and manage pulmonary complications has been shown be safe in adult cancer patients, but whether its is pediatric patients remains unclear. Thus, describe the landscape FB outcomes help define populations most likely benefit from procedure, we undertook a retrospective review FBs performed younger than 21 years treated at our institution 2002 2017. We found that greater volume total fluid instilled during BAL was significantly associated increased probabilities positive culture (p=0.042), bacterial (p=0.037), viral (p=0.0496). In more half cases, findings resulted alterations antimicrobial treatment. Our study suggests for safe, provides diagnostic and/or therapeutic benefits, implications treatment decisions.