Hospital experience of an avian influenza A (H5N1) outbreak in Turkey

This study reports the hospital experience of an avian influenza (H5N1) outbreak in Turkey. Out of a total of 602 cases, H5N1 infection was not suspected in 290, prophylactic therapy was given to 165 due to contact with poultry, and 147 were hospitalized, 10 of whom were confirmed as having H5N1 infection. Three peaks in the number of hospital applications were observed during the epidemic; all were related to particular items in the media. The proportion of confirmed H5N1 cases was 1.66% of all applications. The mean age was 10.4 years for confirmed cases and 16.3 years for both unconfirmed and confirmed H5N1 cases in contact with poultry. The mean hospitalization period was 5.0 and 12.2 days in suspected and confirmed cases, respectively. A total of 8 days of mechanical ventilator usage was required for the 10 confirmed cases. Four confirmed cases died during the outbreak. Efforts should be directed towards training health professionals, improving crisis management during an outbreak and, as children are prone to H5N1 infections, implementing school training programmes.