One in three children who suffer from bacterial meningitis lives with permanent neurological damage from the infection, according to a new epidemiological study led by Karolinska Institutet and published in the leading medical journal JAMA Network Open.
For the first time, researchers have identified the long-term health burden of bacterial meningitis: although the bacterial infection can currently be treated with antibiotics, it often leads to permanent neurological damage, and the impact is severe because it often affects children.
When a child is affected, the whole family is affected. When a child as young as three suffers from cognitive impairment, movement disorders, vision problems, hearing loss or loss, it has a huge impact. These are lifelong disabilities and affected people require medical support for the rest of their lives, so it is a huge burden both for the individual and for society.”
Federico Iovino, Associate Professor of Medical Microbiology at the Department of Neurosciences at Karolinska Institutet and one of the study’s authors
Analysing data from the Swedish Quality Register on bacterial meningitis from 1987 to 2021, the researchers were able to compare just over 3,500 people who had bacterial meningitis as children with just over 32,000 controls from the general population, with an average follow-up period of more than 23 years.
Results show that people diagnosed with bacterial meningitis consistently have a higher prevalence of neurological disorders, such as cognitive impairment, seizures, visual or hearing problems, movement disorders, behavioral disorders, or structural head damage.
The highest risks were for structural head injury (26 times higher), hearing loss (almost eight times higher), and movement impairment (almost five times higher).
About one in three people with bacterial meningitis had at least one neurological disorder, compared with one in 10 in the control group.
“This shows that even if the bacterial infection is cured, many people suffer from neurological disorders afterwards,” says Federico Iovino.
Now that the long-term effects of bacterial meningitis are known, Federico Iovino and his colleagues plan to further their research.
“We are working on developing a treatment that can protect neurons in the brain during the period it takes several days for the antibiotics to fully take effect. We currently have very promising data on human neurons and have now entered the preclinical phase in animal models. Ultimately, we hope to present this in the clinic within the next few years,” says Federico Iovino.
The study was funded by Merck (MSD in Sweden).