What's wrong with a child having a low fever and sweating?

Low-grade fever is a relatively common disease at present, which can have a great impact on the patient's body. When a child has a low-grade fever and sweats, many parents' first reaction is leukemia, because leukemia is often reported. At the beginning, the patient will have a low-grade fever, and finally there will be bleeding gums and decreased appetite. So is the child's low-grade fever and sweating really related to leukemia?

1. Is low-grade fever and sweating a symptom of leukemia?

A low-grade fever refers to a body temperature between 37.3℃ and 38℃. Many diseases can cause low-grade fever, which often causes sweating. However, low-grade fever and sweating do not necessarily mean leukemia; they may also be caused by other diseases. The common symptoms of leukemia include: 1. recurrent fever, which is not effective with antibiotics, and the child may also feel tired; 2. anemia, which usually occurs in the early stages, and the patient may also experience fatigue, loss of appetite, pale complexion, etc.; 3. bleeding, which may affect the whole body, such as nasal bleeding, ecchymosis, bleeding gums, and skin petechiae, and may also manifest as bleeding in the ears, fundus, and other internal organs such as the digestive tract or respiratory tract.

2. The harm of leukemia

Intestinal failure:

It is also a complication symptom of leukemia patients, which is extremely harmful to people. Since chemotherapy drugs and radiotherapy used in the treatment of leukemia affect gastrointestinal function and lead to gastric failure, nutritional supplementation for patients has become a prominent problem. Currently, the use of subclavian vein catheterization to the superior vena cava for high-nutrition infusion only solves part of the problem. Nutritional deficiency can lead to complications such as pneumonia and enteritis.

Infect:

How harmful is leukemia? Leukemia causes a decrease in normal white blood cells, especially neutrophils. At the same time, factors such as chemotherapy also lead to a lack of granulocytes, making patients prone to serious infections or sepsis. Bacteria that commonly cause infection include: Gram-positive bacteria, such as Staphylococcus aureus, hemolytic Streptococcus, Corynebacterium and other Gram-negative bacteria, such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, etc.

3. Examination items for leukemia

Routine bone marrow examination: Bone marrow examination is the most routine examination for leukemia. If leukemia is suspected, a bone marrow puncture must be performed to count and classify the various types of cells in the bone marrow.

Cytogenetic examination: This leukemia test also requires the aspiration of about 2 ml of bone marrow to understand the nature of the leukemia cells and whether there are any abnormalities in the chromosomes. Leukemia with chromosomal abnormalities often has a worse prognosis than leukemia without chromosomal abnormalities. This is the main method for detecting leukemia.

Predisposing factors for leukemia

1. Those with family history. If there is a family history, the likelihood of developing leukemia increases greatly. After one of the monozygotic twins develops leukemia, the chance of their siblings developing leukemia within one year is five times that of the normal population. The incidence of leukemia in high-risk families is 16 times higher than that in normal families. Familial leukemia accounts for about 7/1000 of leukemia. Genetic diseases with special chromosomal abnormalities, such as DOWN syndrome and Fanconi anemia, have a much higher incidence of leukemia than the normal population. The incidence of leukemia in Down syndrome is 50/100,000, which is 20 times higher than that in the normal population.

2. Children born from marriages between close relatives. The incidence of genetic diseases among offspring of consanguineous marriages is 150 times higher than that among offspring of non-consanguineous marriages. These children often have chromosomal mutations and are therefore more likely to get leukemia.