Sreemoyee Chatterjee
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Written By: Sreemoyee Chatterjee | Updated : August 7, 2018 11:15 AM IST
While there is no point-of-service test for Kawasaki disease till now, very soon there would be ways to accurately test blood for diagnosing this severe ailment affecting young children and infants, thanks to the recent findings of a group of researchers from UC San Diego School of Medicine and Imperial College London. This condition is marked by inflammationof blood vessels across the body and can result in coronary artery aneurysms in a quarter of affected children, finally leading to heart attacks, congestive heart failure or sudden death.
According to a report by City News Service, these researchers have found evidence in the gene sequencing of the participants that can gradually lead to a test that can be used in the emergency department and hospital lab setting for diagnostic purpose.
"As there is no diagnostic test for Kawasaki disease, late diagnosis often results in delayed or missed treatment and an increased risk of coronary artery aneurysms," said Dr Jane C Burns, a paediatrician at Rady Children's Hospital-San Diego and director of the Kawasaki Disease Research Center at UCSD, reported City News Service.
Out of 404 children studied for the research, most of them were from San Diego and the rest cam e from United Kingdom, Spain and the Netherlands with Kawasaki disease or similar conditions. While prevalence of Kawasaki disease is less in the United States, it goes up in San Diego County, as per the records of UC San Diego School of Medicine.
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