Introduction:

Meningitis and encephalitis are potentially fatal neuroinfections for the pediatric population. The estimated incidence for meningitis is 4 to 30 cases per 100.000 habitants and for encephalitis is 3 to 7 cases per 100.000 habitants.

Material and method:

An observational, descriptive, retrospective study was conducted with the objective of identifying the clinical, microbiological characteristics and outcomes of a cohort of pediatric patients diagnosed with encephalitis or meningitis, from a Hospital in Cali, Colombia during March 2017 and December 2020. Data from clinical records was obtained.

Results:

A descriptive statistical analysis was performed, finding a higher proportion of Streptococcus agalactiae isolation in bacterial cases, while Enterovirus was the most frequently isolated microorganism in the viral cases. The most frequent symptom at admission was fever in 78.6% of the patients, followed by emesis (61.9%) and sensory alteration (52.4%).

Conclusions:

Our study showed that molecular testes are crucial for the etiological diagnosis and proper management of meningitis and encephlaitis

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