Pediatric bacterial keratitis: clinical features, causative organisms, and outcome during a 13-year study period

To review the clinical features, causative organisms, complications, and outcomes of patients with pediatric bacterial keratitis at a tertiary care eye hospital.

We conducted a retrospective study at a tertiary care eye centre on clinically diagnosed pediatric patients with bacterial keratitis between 2007 and 2019. Poor outcomes were labelled if any of the following were present: final best-corrected visual acuity worse than 20/200, a drop in best-corrected visual acuity by 1 line or more, perforated corneas, endophthalmitis, and graft failure.

The study included 43 cases of bacterial keratitis. Female and male patients represented 60.5% and 39.5% of the sample, respectively, with a mean age of 9.3 ± 5.9 years. The rate of culture positivity was 60.5%. The most common causative organisms were coagulase-negative Staphylococcus (23.1%), Pseudomonas (23.1%), and Streptococcus pneumoniae (19.2%). Culture-positive bacterial keratitis was associated with infiltrates ≥2 mm (p = 0.039), as determined by the results of multivariate analysis. Gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria exhibited 100% sensitivity to the tested fluoroquinolones. Complications included visually significant scars (55.8%), cataracts (14.0%), perforations (9.3%), corneal neovascularization (7.0%), nonhealing epithelial defects (7.0%), and endophthalmitis (4.7%). Corneal perforation was associated with the development of endophthalmitis (p < 0.001). On multivariate analysis, the only factor associated with a poor outcome was poor presenting visual acuity (p = 0.020).

Gram-positive bacteria were the most common cause of pediatric microbial keratitis. Positive cultures were associated with larger infiltrates. The only adverse prognostic factor was poor presenting vision.