Childhood osteomyelitis. A five-year analysis of 118 cases in Nigerian children.

During the years 1976 through 1980, 118 children with osteomyelitis were seen at our hospital, an incidence of almost 24 cases per year. Twenty-eight of these had sickle cell disease. Males were more commonly affected than females, with a ratio of 2.1 to 1, and bones of the lower extremities were more commonly involved, than those of the upper extremities with a 2 to 1 ratio. Seventy patients were anemic, with hemoglobin levels of 10 g/dl or less. Staphylococcus aureus was the most common organism isolated from patients with sickle cell disease, as well as those with normal genotype.