Novel care pathway to optimise antimicrobial prescribing for uncomplicated community-acquired pneumonia: study protocol for a prospective before–after cohort study in the emergency department of a tertiary care Canadian children’s hospital

INTRODUCTION: Evidence-based recommendations for paediatric community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) diagnosis and management are needed. Uncomplicated CAP is often caused by respiratory viruses, especially in younger children; these episodes self-resolve without antibiotic treatment. Unfortunately, there are no clinical criteria that reliably discriminate between viral and bacterial disease, and so the majority of children diagnosed with CAP are …