Prevalence of rheumatic heart disease among school children in Ethiopia: A multisite echocardiography-based screening

Auscultation-based surveys in Ethiopia conducted in the late 1990's reported a rural prevalence of 4.6/1000 and an urban prevalence of 6.4/1000 of rheumatic heart disease (RHD). With echo-based screening, we aimed to estimate the national prevalence of RHD in school children by taking school-based samples from six regions across the country using the 2012 World Heart Federation echocardiographic criteria.

We conducted a cross-sectional echocardiographic screening of RHD in school children aged 6-18years from 28 randomly selected primary and secondary schools found in six different geographic regions of Ethiopia. We used the standardized WHF echocardiographic criteria.

A total of 3238 children (48.5% females) were screened. The mean age was 13.2±3.2years. Of these, 44 patients (1.4%) met the WHF criteria for definite RHD, while 15 (0.5%) met the criteria for borderline disease, yielding a prevalence of 19 [13.9-23.4, 95% CI] cases per 1000 school children between the ages of 6-18years. The majority of those who tested positive were girls (26/44). The prevalence was lowest in children aged 6-9years and otherwise uniformly distributed across ages 10-18years. Definite RHD involved the mitral valve in 42 subjects, 39 of whom had mitral regurgitation and 3 with mitral stenosis. The aortic valve was affected in 6 children. The ratio of definite to borderline cases was 2.9.

This study demonstrated a consistent pattern of high prevalence of asymptomatic RHD with definite disease predominating over borderline involvement across six regions of Ethiopia.