Respiratory Syncytial Virus Infection in Elderly and High-Risk Adults

During four consecutive winters, prospective surveillance was conducted in cohorts of 608 healthy elderly patients and 540 adults with chronic heart or lung disease, and viral studies were also performed in 1388 adults hospitalized for acute cardiopulmonary conditions. Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infections developed annually in 3 to 7 percent of healthy elderly patients and in 4 to 10 percent of high-risk adults. In the hospitalized cohort, RSV infection accounted for 11 percent of patients with pneumonia, 11 percent of those with chronic lung disease, and 7 percent of those with asthma. Prospective surveillance during four consecutive winters found that respiratory syncytial virus infections developed annually in 3 to 7 percent of healthy elderly patients and in 4 to 10 percent of high-risk adults. Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) was first recognized in 1957 as a cause of bronchiolitis in infants and is the most commonly identified cause of lower respiratory tract infection in young children. 1 Mild illness in young adults with reinfection was described and confirmed in subsequent family studies. 2 , 3 However, RSV was not recognized as a potentially serious problem in older adults until the 1970s, when outbreaks of the virus occurred in long-term care facilities. 4 – 7 Since then, additional studies in hospitalized adults have suggested that RSV may be an important cause of illness in community-dwelling elderly people. 8 , 9 Most previous studies . . .