Covid impact on RSV Emergency Presentations: BronchStart

• Research type

  Research Study

• Full title

  Impact of Covid19 on Respiratory Syncytial Virus seasonality and disease severity in UK children (BronchStart)

• IRAS ID

  297802

• Contact name

  Damian Roland

• Contact email

  dr98@le.ac.uk

• Sponsor organisation

  University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust

• Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier

  NCT04959734

• Duration of Study in the UK

  1 years, 0 months, 0 days

• Research summary

  Bronchiolitis is a very common winter disease that normally affects children less than one year of age. It is a common reason for parents and carers to bring their child to an Emergency Department (ED) and the frequent need for hospital admission means that paediatric units are at their capacity each winter.
  During the COVID19 pandemic the virus that causes bronchiolitis (Respiratory Syncytial Virus; RSV) disappeared meaning this winter there have been virtually no cases of bronchiolitis in the United Kingdom. This phenomenon has been observed in many other countries around the world.
  Evidence from Australia suggests as restrictions such as social distancing for COVID19 are relaxed bronchiolitis returns, even in the summer. At the release of lockdown the return has been so dramatic in some areas of Australia the summer time numbers are above a typical winter. There is also evidence it may affect older children up to 2 years of age.

  Therefore in the UK for the period 2021/22 there is a need to understand:

  (a) the onset of RSV spread at the earliest opportunity. This is important as some children are at higher risk of hospitalisation, intensive care admission or death if they contract RSV; knowing when to passively immunise these children is a public health priority.
  (b) whether the population at risk is a wider age range than normal and whether disease severity is greater as these will both effect service planning;

  This study will use staff in Emergency Department to report, in real time, case of bronchiolitis that they see and record essential, but non-identifying, information about them. We will also undertake genomic sequencing (in an anonymised fashion) on respiratory samples taken to understand how RSV spreads and if different RSV genotypes associated with different severity of disease

• REC name

  London - City & East Research Ethics Committee

• REC reference

  21/HRA/1844

• Date of REC Opinion

  18 Jan 2022

• REC opinion

  Favourable Opinion