Bacterial meningitis in babies <90 days of age

Lead investigators   

Dr Paul Heath 
Child Health and Vaccine Institute
St George’s
University of London
Cranmer Terrace
London SW17 0RE

Research Fellow Dr Ifeanyichukwu O Okike 

Email: meningitis@sgul.ac.uk

Web: http://www.neonin.org.uk/

Overview

• Meningitis is associated with significant mortality and morbidity in infants in the first three months of life.
• The most recent national surveillance study (1996-7) identified an overall mortality of 10%, with 50% of cases having some form of disability at five-year follow-up (24% serious); a risk of serious disability 16-fold higher than that of GP-matched controls.
• The mortality has declined over the last two decades, but there has been no change in the long term morbidity.
• There are a number of reasons why the epidemiology and management of meningitis in this age group may have changed over the last 10 years and an accurate picture of this is needed to allow prioritisation and development of new strategies.

Duration:  July 2010 to July 2011

Funding: Meningitis Research Foundation

Ethical approval: Ethical approval has been received from Cambridge MREC

Further Information

• Study Protocol (PDF, 518KB, 2 pages)
• Questionnaire (PDF, 372KB, 8 pages)

Support Group:  Meningitis Research Foundation