Profile of Paediatric Morbidity in Hospitals in the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 2019 to 2021

Knowledge of morbidity is essential for planning and evaluating health services and assessing a country's level of social and economic development. At a global level, morbidity is constantly evolving in line with the epidemiological transition. This study aims to describe the profile of paediatric hospital morbidity in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).It is a retrospective, multicentre, cross-sectional study conducted between 2019 and 2021 in five referral health facilities in four cities of the country.Of the 2,170 cases analysed, 70% of admissions involved children under 5 years of age, with an average age of 4.43 years. Males accounted for 53.5% of admissions. The highest admission rates were recorded in May and December. Chronic pathologies accounted for 6.5% of cases, 50% of which were related to sickle-cell anaemia. The average consultation time was 4 days, with 63.4% of patients consulting within the first 3 days of their illness. The main reasons for consultation were fever (62.4%), physical asthenia (25.1%), vomiting (23.3%), cough (14.7%) and diarrhoea (12.1%). The most common diagnoses were malaria (61.1%), anaemia (28%), gastroenteritis (12.7%), septicaemia (11.4%) and urinary tract infections (10.3%). The treatments prescribed mainly included antibiotic therapy (64.4%), antimalarials (57.7%), antipyretics (52.5%), infusions (43.9%) and blood transfusions (34.2%). The average length of hospital stay was 5 ± 4 days, with 42.3% of patients staying less than 4 days. The mortality rate was 8.1%, and 9.3% of patients were discharged against medical advice.In conclusion, paediatric morbidity in the DRC remains dominated by communicable diseases such as malaria and gastroenteritis despite the global epidemiological transition. Developing a national epidemiological bulletin and training focused on the common pathologies identified could change the profile of paediatric morbidity and improve the quality of paediatric care in the country.