Identifying Posterior Fossa Abnormality in Pediatric Aerodigestive Patients, a Case Series

Multidisciplinary clinics like Aerodigestive programs focus on issues associated with airway, pulmonary, and gastrointestinal issues. Rarely, significant neurological issues like posterior fossa abnormality are identified as the primary etiology. We describe 3 such patients and compare their clinical presentation to the other patients seen in Aerodigestive clinic.

A retrospective chart review was conducted to review the 3 posterior fossa patients and the remainder of children that were referred to the Aerodigestive Clinic at Children's Hospital Los Angeles from June 2016 to August 2018. Clinical characteristics including triple endoscopies and sleep studies were recorded.

Of the 110 patients included for review, 3 patients (3%) had an underlying posterior fossa abnormality; all of whom had symptoms of sleep disordered breathing along with dysphagia compared with 30% incidence of this symptom profile in the remaining Aerodigestive population.

Presence of sleep disordered breathing and dysphagia, with underlying vomiting history, warrants considering evaluation for posterior fossa abnormalities in addition to traditional workup for aerodigestive disorders. Due to the rarity of this presentation and small sample size, future studies with multicenter collaboration may help better describe identifiers to delineate this population with similar aerodigestive symptoms and clarify diagnostic algorithms.