Prevalence of Enteric Adenovirus Gastroenteritis and Co-infection with Rotavirus in under-Five-Year-Old Children, Qom-Iran

The study was performed to determine the prevalence and co-infections with Rotavirus in children under five years of age.

Gastroenteritis-associated viral infections are a cause of death among young children in Worldwide, especially in developing countries. The species F Adenovirus (40 and 41) is responsible for rang of the cases of acute diarrhea among infants children.

During 9 months, 130 children with intestinal symptoms referred to the pediatric ward of the hospital were enrolled in this study. After collecting fecal samples, viral genomes were extracted; and then amplified and typed using polymerase chain reaction by Adenovirus-specific primers. Rotavirus was detected in our previous study on the same samples and the results were used to evaluate for co-infection.

Mean age of the patients was 32.09±32.68 months. 60% and 40% of the patients were males and females, respectively. Adenovirus infection was identified among 23 cases of the children (17.7%), 21 cases (91%) type 41 and 2 cases (9%) type 40. Fever was the most clinical manifestation and there were no significant relations between the clinical symptoms and the Adenovirus infection. Co-infection was found in only 5 cases (21.7%) of patients.

These data show that Adenovirus infection plays an important role in acute diarrheal infection in Qom. In addition, our findings indicated that there was a co-infection between Adenovirus and Rotavirus, stating a serious problem in children less than five years of age.