2.1 Study population
This retrospective study collected data from the children (aged 0-6 years) who underwent examine HCMV-DNA at the Department of Medical Laboratory, Luohu People’s Hospital, Shenzhen, China, from July 2019 to April 2023. This study was approved by the Reproductive Medicine Ethics Committee of Shenzhen Luohu People’s Hospital (2023-LHQRMYY-KYLL-028).
A total of 223 children were included in the study, including 132 HCMV-infected children and 91 non-HCMV-infected children. According to reference intervals of blood cell analysis for children in People’s Republic of China (PRC) health industry standard WS/T 779-202113, Children were divided into five subgroups (i.e., children at 0 to 21 days (0d-21d, children at 22 days to 6 months (22d-6m, only children younger than 6 months were recruited in this group ), children at 7 months to 11 months (7m-11m, only children younger than 1 year were recruited in this group), children at 12 months to 23 months (12m-23m, only children younger than 2 years were recruited in this group), and children at 2 years to 6 years (2y-6y, only children younger than 6 years were recruited in this group) based on the age at which HCMV-DNA was detected. The newborn with HCMV-DNA positive detected in saliva and/or urine of infants aged 0d-21d can be considered as congenital HCMV infection 14.