Pitt Pediatrics congratulates Catherine Forster, MD, MS, FAAP, for her recent publication in Hospital Pediatrics, titled, “Frequency of Treatment Failure of UTIs in Children With Congenital Urinary Tract Anomalies.” Forster is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics in the Paul C. Gaffney Division of Pediatric Hospital Medicine. 
This research, which was conducted in collaboration with researchers from nearly a dozen pediatric hospitals and institutions across the country, aims to explore why children with congenital anomalies of the kidney and urinary tract and neurogenic bladder (CAKUT/NGB) are at higher risk of treatment failure for urinary tract infections (UTIs) than children with normal genitourinary anatomy. This gap in outcomes is unfortunately under-investigated in current literature, limiting knowledge in effective treatments and outcomes.
In order to address this issue, the study was designed to describe the rate of treatment failure in children with CAKUT/NGB and compare the duration of antibiotics between those with and without treatment failure.
Forster and her collaborative researchers looked at nearly 500 children from 0 to 17 years old with CAKUT/NGB admitted to the emergency department with fever or hypothermia and diagnosed with UTI between 2017 and 2018. Of this number, approximately 6% were subsequently readmitted to the hospital for UTI of the same pathogen within 30 days due to treatment failure.
Further research indicated that there was no meaningful difference in treatment failure as a result of the duration of intravenous antibiotics. However, bacteremia did present at higher rates in children with treatment failure.
Ultimately, this work filled in a necessary gap of knowledge regarding the rates of treatment failure for children with CAKUT/NGB suffering from UTIs, and indicated the need to conduct larger studies to further investigate the effect bacteremia may have in those diagnoses.
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