1 About 50 million people travel each

year from industrialized EPZ5676 mouse countries to tropical or subtropical destinations.2 Although estimations on the number of children traveling internationally are limited, travel data for US residents indicate that about 1.5 to 2 million US Americans of age under 16 years travel annually to tropical or subtropical countries.3,4 In the UK, imported diseases account for 2% of pediatric hospitalization.5 Physicians have to be aware that potential pathogens differ in various factors, such as the population of travelers,6,7 the travel destination,8,9 and the incubation period of pathogens typical or specific for the tropics and subtropics.10–12 Travel medicine standards are increasingly based on evidence and moving away from reliance on single expert opinions. Nevertheless, previous studies on pediatric travel-related morbidity were using post-travel questionnaires13,14 or consisted only of small

study populations from single centers with focus on individual diseases.15–20 A certain number of multicentric reviews were performed; however, most of them focused on the demographic characteristics21 and on diagnoses without linking them to the symptoms presented by young patients returning from travel. This study analyzes systematically demographic, travel, and clinical data of travelers of age <20 years returning from tropical and subtropical countries and presenting at the outpatient travel clinic of the Department of Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine (DITM) in Munich, Germany. Stratified into age Trichostatin A groups, the study describes the spectrum of imported infectious diseases and syndromes among the study population. Furthermore, it evaluates the risk for acquiring infectious diseases and syndromes

for different travel destinations. From January 1999 through December 2009, 42,863 patients with symptoms or individuals for medical checkup presented at the DITM, including 2,558 (6.0%) individuals of age <20 years. Two criteria were defined to include them into this study: the individuals who had a clinically or laboratory confirmed diagnosis (1,380 subjects fulfilled HA-1077 concentration criteria: 53.9%) and the individuals who had traveled to a tropical or subtropical country before presentation (1,173 subjects fulfilled criteria: 45.9%). Overall, 890 (34.8%) travelers of age <20 years fulfilled both criteria (study population). Among them, 687 (77.2%) individuals had a national health insurance [419 (47.1%) with referrals from physicians of former consultations, 268 (30.1%) individuals without referrals]. The consultation fees of the remaining 203 (22.8%) individuals were paid otherwise (eg, private health insurance, privately, employers of parents, or others). Demographic data [sex, age, and origin (country of birth)] were analyzed for the whole study population of 890 travelers (Table 1).