SAN DIEGO – Pit bulls caused 42% of dog bites for which children were hospitalized, a 4-year retrospective study showed.
Bites by pit bulls had a 40% greater odds of a full trauma team response, and were linked to a 3-day longer mean hospital stay, compared with bites by other dogs [4.2 days (standard deviation, 5.1) vs. 1.3 days (SD, 1.3); P = .02], reported lead author Dr. Claudia Yeung of Arizona Children’s Center and Maricopa Integrated Health System in Phoenix.“It’s the young children who are most affected, and the dog is often in the home,” Dr. Yeung added. Adults need to be informed about the risks that pit bulls and other large dog breeds may pose to young children, even if the dog is a pet with no known history of aggression, Dr. Yeung said at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Dr. Claudia Yeung
Of about 885,000 dog bites that need medical attention in the United States every year, half are in children, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. To understand predictors of bite severity, Dr. Yeung and her colleagues reviewed the medical charts of children and adolescents who presented with dog bites to the emergency department at Arizona Children’s Center from March 2010 through March 2014.<b/>A total of 223 children presented, of whom 33 (14.8%) were hospitalized and 12 (5.4%) required the response of a full trauma team, Dr. Yeung said.
Hospitalized children in the study averaged just 6 years of age (SD, 4 years), and almost 82% needed surgical intervention in the operating room, she added. Children younger than age 5 years were more likely to sustain injuries to the face or neck than were older children (51% vs. 21%; P = .001), she reported.
Besides pit bulls, the most commonly reported culprits were German shepherds, Rottweilers, and Labrador retrievers, Dr. Yeung said.
A limitation of the study was that some medical records lacked data on the breed of the dog, Dr. Yeung added.
She reported no external funding sources or financial conflicts.