Prognosis in White and Colored Tuberculous Children According to Initial Chest X-ray Findings

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Abstract
The author discusses the extent of chest lesion demonstrated at initial x-ray examination in a group of 1148 tuberculous children whose infection was discovered prior to 15 yrs. of age, and who have been followed for varying periods of time in a study of their mortality from tuberculosis. The analyses include records of those infected children admitted to a special clinic during infancy and also those infected older siblings examined in a general pediatric dispensary. Infection was detd. in the children of these families by their reaction to intra-dermal testing with old tuberculin. The races represented have an unequal distribution, there being 404 white and 744 colored children in the study. The total 10-yr. mortality from tuberculosis in white children infected before age 3 and showing only nodal lesion or negative films was about 4% while for the colored children it was 7.6%. White children presenting similar findings at first x-rays between ages 3 and 15 suffered no mortality during the period of observation; colored children between these ages whose initial films showed no parenchymal lesion suffered a mortality of 3.3% within a 10-yr. observation period. The lower death rate in children past infancy appears to be related to the lessened frequency of parenchymal involvement and to an improved resistance to nodal lesions.

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