Pathogen epidemic characteristics of acute upper respiratory tract infection among the elderly patients in Shaoxing City, Zhejiang Province from 2020 to 2023

ObjectiveTo monitor and analyze the epidemiological characteristics of viral pathogens among elderly patients with acute upper respiratory tract infections in Shaoxing City from 2020 to 2023, to guide prevention and treatment.MethodsNasopharyngeal swab samples were collected from elderly patients at the Infectious Disease Outpatient Department of Shaoxing infectious disease surveillance sentinel hospital for acute upper respiratory tract infections between January 2020 and December 2023. The multiple nucleic acid detection method was used to detect the influenza A virus (Flu A), influenza B virus (Flu B), respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), human rhinovirus (HRV), adenoviruses (ADV), and Mycoplasma pneumoniae (MP). Epidemiological analysis was conducted on the six pathogens mentioned above. χ2 test was used for statistical analysis.ResultsOf the 3 670 nasopharyngeal swab samples collected from the elderly patients with acute upper respiratory tract infections aged 60-89,2 330 were positive, with a detection rate of 63.49%. Among these, 2 293 were single pathogen infections, including 1 255 Flu A, 356 Flu B, 63 ADV, 76 RSV, 363 HRV, and 180 MP cases, with positive rates of 34.20%, 9.70%, 1.72%, 2.07%, 9.89%, and 4.90%, respectively. A total of 37 cases were mixed infections with two or more pathogens, with a positive detection rate of 1.01%. The rate of severe cases was significantly higher in patients with mixed infections compared to single pathogen infections (χ2=24.468, P<0.001). Among the single pathogen infections, ADV had the highest rate of severe cases at 4.76%, followed by Flu A at 3.19% and RSV at 2.63%. The lowest rate of severe cases was caused by MP infection at 0.56%. The distribution of severe cases of the six respiratory pathogen infections corresponded to their epidemic peaks.ConclusionAcute upper respiratory tract infections in the elderly are closely related to different respiratory pathogens, and mixed respiratory pathogen infections may increase the severity of respiratory cases in elderly patients.