A Comparative Study on Accuracy of Liquid Crystal
Forehead, Digital Electronic Axillary, Infrared Tympanic
with Glass-Mercury Rectal Thermometer in Infants and
Young Childrent
AREE KONGPANICHKUL, M.D.*,
SUTHUNYA BUNJONGPAK, M.D.*
Affiliation : * Department of Pediatrics, Nakhon Pathom Hospital, Nakhon Pathom 73000, Thailand.
t Presented at the 7th Annual Meeting of the Ministry of Public Health, Pattaya, Thailand. On 2nd September 1999.
AbstractThis study was carried out to assess the accuracy of three devices namely. liquid crystal
forehead, digital electronic axillary and infrared tympanic thermometer, using a glass-mercury
rectal thermometer as the control. The subjects were two hundred children aged 0-48 months.
The mean rectal temperature was 38.0 ± 0.9!°C; forehead, 37.83 ± 0.94°C; tympanic, 37.77 ±
0.95°C, and axillary, 37.71 ± 0.86°C. Compared to the rectal temperature, all values were sig-
nificantly lower (p < 0.05). Forehead, tympanic and axillary temperature differed from rectal tem-
perature by at least 0.5°C in 33.33 per cent, 23.5 per cent and 31.5 per cent of subjects, and at least
I oc in 22 per cent, I per cent and 6 per cent of subjects respectively. Accuracy in detection of
fever was 79 per cent for forehead, 85.5 per cent for tympanic and 84 per cent for axillary
thermometry. Sensitivity of the three devices was 67-83 per cent in detection of fever and 64-77
per cent in detection of high fever. Tympanic thermometry had the best performance while
forehead thermometry had the poorest. After using revised diagnostic threshold temperature by
ROC curves, sensitivity of each device improved but accuracy was nearly the same. It is con-
cluded that the three devices are not suitable as a substitute for a glass-mercury rectal thermo-
meter in assessment of fever in infants and young children.
Keywords : Thermometers, Comparative Study, Children
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