Kawasaki Disease

Summary pointsKawasaki disease is an acute febrile illness that mainly affects children under 5It is the most common cause of acquired heart disease in children in the developed worldDiagnosis is based on fever of at least five days’ duration and four of five diagnostic clinical criteriaThe typical clinical features appear sequentially and are rarely all there at presentation.The diagnosis should be considered in any child with prolonged fever, irrespective of other featuresIntravenous immunoglobulin and aspirin given 5-10 days after onset of fever reduce the incidence of coronary artery lesions from around 20% to around 5%