Abstrakt

Junk food as cause of non-infectious sore throat in children.

Zafarullah Beigh*, Faheem Khalid, Suhail Ahmad Choh

Introduction: Sore throat is one of the common reasons for outpatient and emergency visits among children. Sore throat is a symptom in which there is painful burning or scratching sensation in the back of throat. Various causative agents for sore throat are mentioned in literature. This study is about non-infectious sore throat in children due to commonly consumed spicy food “junk foods”. Material and Method: This study includes one hundred and seventy six Sore throat patients below 16 years of age, who gave history of eating junk food. Examination of all patients was done and advised to stop eating junk foods. Patient’s symptoms and signs were recorded and follow up was done after 2 days, 4 days and after 7 days. Results: We found that painful burning or scratching sensation in the back of the throat was relieved in 156 out of 176 patients after 2 days and pain on swallowing was relieved in 166 patients out of 176 patients after 2 days. This figure goes up 4 days after stopping eating junk food to 166 out of 176 and 170 out of176 respectively. Similarly, on examination of oropharynx we found that congestion on oropharyngeal structures was absent in 152 out of 176 patients after 2 days and figure goes up to 165 out of 176 patients after 4 days.