Variation in practice remains in the UK management of paediatric febrile neutropenia

Serious infection affects around 20% of patients who present febrile and neutropenic.1 Febrile neutropenia (FN) is thus a well-recognised medical emergency. Addressing the challenges of both rapid delivery of antibiotics to patients at risk of life-threatening sepsis and appropriate antibiotic stewardship to reduce antibiotic overuse continues to keep this a priority for clinicians, patients and parents. Audits of FN practice have previously demonstrated variation in definitions for FN and its management.1 ,2 In September 2012, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published the ‘Neutropenic sepsis: prevention and management of neutropenic sepsis in cancer patients’3 guideline and we sought to assess if this has reduced variations in practice. This reaudit included 45 UK centres (14 …