PARROT Trial
PARROT Trial
Prophylactic antibiotics to prevent recurrent lower respiratory tract infections.
There are large numbers of children with neurological impairment (NI) including conditions such as cerebral palsy. Many are prone to chest infections which can lead to long stays in hospital, possible complications and even premature death. Parrot is an international trial that will evaluate whether prophylactic antibiotics reduce hospital admissions for children with neurological impairments.
Despite the impact on children, their families and health services, there is very little information on how best to prevent these severe infections. Some doctors prescribe long-term antibiotics but we don’t really know whether this treatment makes any difference to the numbers of chest infections children suffer from, or whether these antibiotics can cause long term harm.
The trial is led by colleagues at the University of Liverpool. It has started in Australia but has been held up in part by the pandemic and required some redesigning to be able to begin. The trial will begin in England when NHS and NIHR Clinical Research Network teams are once again able to support clinical non-COVID-19 studies. PenCRU provides expertise on outcome measures and public involvement in the research with members of our Family Faculty. Members of the Family Faculty met in the summer of 2021 to re-start the project.
The research is funded by the NIHR Health Technology Assessment programme.
You can find out more on the PARROT website.