Aim: To describe the epidemiology of paediatric bone infections in a single health district in England with particular reference to incidence and the changing pattern of the disease.

Method: Cases of chronic osteomyelitis and chronic regional multifocal osteomyelitis were excluded leaving 53 children diagnosed with acute haematological osteomyelitis (AHO) at a paediatric orthopaedic unit between January 2000 and December 2005. Patients were identified from the hospital coding system using the keywords ‘bone infection’ and ‘osteomyelitis’. The data were collected retrospectively from the patients’ hospital records and included demographic information, the delay between symptoms and presentation, clinical presentation, site of infection, organisms identified and laboratory results.

Results: The mean age of presentation was 40 months (range 0.5–179). The highest age incidence was between 0–3 yrs. There was no sex predilection with 27 girls and 26 boys. The mean duration of symptoms before presentation was 3.4 days (range 0–14 days). The presenting symptoms were pain at the affected site in 100% of cases, pyrexia (temperature > 38°C) in 47.1%, swelling of the affected site in 47.1%. The commonest bone affected was the femoral metaphysis. The commonest bacterium isolated was staphylococcus aureus. WBC, CRP and ESR were elevated in 44%, 84% and 92.1 % of the cases respectively. Plain radiographs and bone scan demonstrated signs of osteomyelitis in 32.1% and 78.8 % respectively. Surgical intervention was required in 21 patients.

Conclusions: The demographics and clinical presentation of AHO has not changed over the years. The commonest organism involved remains Staphylococcus aureus. ESR and bone scans were the most sensitive screening test for diagnosing the condition. Early initiation of third generation cephalosporin antibiotic therapy and surgical decompression, when necessary, was the mainstay of treatment.