Rotavirus infection in a tertiary hospital: laboratory diagnosis and impact of immunization on pediatric hospitalization

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Rotavirus (RV) is the main etiological agent of diarrhea in childhood; its laboratory diagnosis is crucial to guide the clinical management and prevention of its spread. RV immunization was introduced in Brazilian 6-month-old children in 2006. The present study was aimed to evaluate three methodologies used for human RV detection in stool samples obtained from patients hospitalized due to gastroenteritis in a teaching hospital and report the impact of RV immunization in hospitalization by diarrhea. METHODS: 293 stool samples collected in the 2001-2008 period were analyzed by enzyme immunoassay (EIA), latex agglutination (LA) and polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE). RESULTS: Rotavirus was detected in 34.8 percent of samples by LA assay, 28.3 percent of samples by EIA assay and in 25.6 percent of samples by PAGE assay. Considering the PAGE method as gold standard, the sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of EIA were 94.6 percent, 94.4 percent and 94.5 percent, and to LA were 82.6 percent, 81.6 percent and 81.9 percent, respectively. CONCLUSION: These results indicate that antigen detection by EIA is a rapid, sensitive and specific method, and could be used in large-scale applications for screening stool samples suspected of RV infection. This study showed decreased incidence of RV infection in hospitalized children prior to the implementation of the national immunization program against RV.