Clinical - epidemiological profile and diagnosis of Influenza A H1N1 cases by real time RTPCR at a tertiary care institute of India: the war is not over yet

Abstract

Background: Influenza A virus is a common human pathogen that has caused serious respiratory illness and death over the past century. In April 2009, WHO declared pandemic influenza A H1N1 public health emergency of international concern. India is reeling under the worst H1N1 influenza outbreak with over 18,000 affected cases and over 1000 deaths by the year 2015. Methods: The present study was conducted to find the clinical and epidemiological profile of H1N1 influenza A cases and a real time RT-PCR was standardized and evaluated for the detection of H1N1 influenza A virus in suspected cases admitted in a tertiary care hospital of northern India. Results: Of the total 184 clinical samples tested, 48(26.0%) samples were found to be positive for influenza A H1N1 virus by real time RT-PCR. The highest percentage of cases was in the age group of 40-55 years followed by the 20-40 years. The main clinical symptoms were fever(95.8%), breathlessness(77.0%) , cough(68.7%) and sore throat (56.2%).The mortality rate of cases admitted with H1N1 infection was 52.0%. Conclusion: The mutational behavior of H1N1 has been a major future challenge in the part of pharmacotherapy. Rapid and sensitive diagnostic methods like real time RT-PCR increase the capability to detect, understand and assess new viruses for pandemic risk and to track their international spread.