Rotaviruses and Noroviruses as Etiological Agents of Acute Intestinal Diseases of Ukrainian Children.

(1) Background: Rotavirus and norovirus infections are the primary viral causes of childhood diarrhea. In Ukraine, the diarrhea-linked infant mortality rate is low, but the number of children infected is quite high. This study examined the rates of rotavirus and norovirus infections throughout Ukraine. (2) Methods: Fecal samples for children admitted to hospitals in six Ukrainian cities (Kyiv, Lviv, Sumy, Odesa, Kharkiv, and Uman) were tested for the presence of rotavirus and norovirus. (3) Results: The overall rate of hospitalized children suffering from diarrhea with confirmed presence of rotavirus or norovirus in fecal samples was significant (20.67% and 27.94%, respectively). Samples obtained from children from Lviv had significantly higher rates of the viruses, and Kyiv and Uman had significantly lower rotavirus or norovirus detection levels than expected. (4) Conclusion: Childhood diarrhea impacts Ukraine significantly. The economic and societal effects of the failure to address this public health issue are indicated by the hospitalization rate of children with preventable illnesses. The geographical disparities in Ukraine for child hospitalizations caused by rotavirus and norovirus infections could result from environmental (sanitary factors or water purity issues) or social factors. Further research is needed to completely characterize infant viral infections in Ukraine.

A cost minimization analysis of α2b-interferon supplementation in complex pharmacotherapy of rotavirus infection in newborns.

Rotavirus is one of the most important causative agents of gastroenteritis in both infants and children worldwide, resulting in high mortality and morbidity, mainly in low-income, developing countries. Respective analysis of medical records of newborns hospitalized with acute gastroenteritis showed that the use of α2b-interferon in complex pharmacotherapy was characterized by faster reverse development of clinical manifestations of the disease than in patients who did not receive interferon. In our study, we also aimed to estimate the effectiveness of α2b-interferon supplementation in combination pharmacotherapy of newborns with suspected rotavirus infection. Achievement of this goal was possible with the construction of a decision tree model and determination of decision rules for inclusion of α2b-interferon supplementation into the complex pharmacotherapy. The input parameters of the model were hospitalization days of patients stratified by such signs as the presence or absence of rotavirus infection, as well as the additional inclusion of α2b-interferon supplementation in complex pharmacotherapy. The criterion for prediction and decision-making was global retrospective rotavirus prevalence. The feature of the simulation was that the costs were expressed as relative to each other, which allowed unifying the proposed methodology. Retrospective analysis of the clinical database of Ukrainian newborns with acute diarrhea has proved that the decision of α2b-interferon supplementation as additional treatment could be cost-saving under 7.4 times its lower price.