Hospitals seeing more kids with rare illness

South Florida’s children’s hospitals are seeing more cases of a rare COVID-related illness that attacks children and teens.

Ronald Ford, chief medical officer for Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital, said his hospital has treated 18 children with the rare multisystem inflammatory syndrome — seven of them since Aug. 1.

Ford says he saw the increase coming when the state’s positive infection rate rose — and he expects more cases in the next few weeks. The syndrome tends to come on fast and attack children who were exposed to COVID-19 three to four weeks earlier.

“Some arrive in shock-like states,” Ford said.

The most pervasive symptoms are persistent fever and abdominal pain, shortness of breath, vomiting and sometimes a rash or pink eye. All 18 of the children with MIS-C at Joe DiMaggio had antibodies for COVID-19, indicating an earlier rather than current infection.

“Over the last several days we are seeing children with MIS-C coming more regularly and staying in hospital longer, and they are also quite sick,” Ford said. “They are requiring ICU level of care.”

Ford said he and his colleagues at South Florida’s children’s hospitals had been anticipating the burst of new

cases.

“What will drive MIS-C is the number of positive children in the state. That’s why we predicted this,” he said. “We saw the rise in new infections in July. It’s still rare, but the sheer numbers of children infected has gone up.”

The illness, in which multiple body parts — the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, gastrointestinal tract, skin or eyes — can become inflamed, has cropped up in children and young adults under the age of 21.

Along with MIS-C, Ford said Joe DiMaggio also has been treating more children sick with the new coronavirus. While the vast majority of children with COVID-19 have a mild or asymptomatic infection, Ford said Joe DiMaggio has treated some who have pneumonia-like symptoms.

The differentiation tends to be how quickly MIS-C comes on and the intense symptoms such as persistent fever.

“While we have learned how to treat MIS-C, there is still a lot to be learned,” Ford said.

Dr. Keith Meyer, pediatric specialist at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital in Miami, said his hospital is seeing a similar number of children with MIS-C. However, children have been steadily coming into the Miami hospital with the illness since July.

“All the children we have treated have gotten better,” he said. “Most are in and out within a couple of days.”

Meyer urges parents to stay vigilant in monitoring for symptoms. “This should be on their radar if their children appear sick.”

On Thursday, Florida’s Department of Health dashboard reported 43,828 children are infected with COVID-19 statewide — a large increase from earlier in the summer. In midJune only 3,407 children had tested positive.

The dashboard also shows 30 children with MIS-C in Florida, a number that appears outdated, with nearly 30 cases in two South Florida hospitals.

“I would like to see realtime data coming out from the Department of Health,” Ford said.

Ford said it is important for parents, pediatricians and doctors at urgent care centers to recognize the signs of MIS-C and get young people evaluated at a children’s hospital.

As of Aug. 6, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had confirmed 570 cases of MIS-C across 40 states and the District of Columbia, including 10 deaths. While the syndrome affects young adults, too, the average child with the illness is 8 years old.