Missed and delayed diagnosis of neonatal meningitis.

Hydrocephalus is but one of the several sequelae of neonatal meningitis (NM). Other common sequelae include mental retardation, seizures, and sensorineural hearing loss(2). Therefore, studying cases of hydrocephalus alone may not reflect a true picture of unrecognized NM and figures thus obtained may under-estimate the proportion of missed cases. In fact, in the present series too, 4/13 infants presenting with hydrocephalus had seizures also. Further studies are required to determine the proportion of cases of infantile seizures where unrecognized NM could be a contributing factor.