Viral acute gastroenteritis: clinical and epidemiological features of co-infected patients

Acute gastroenteritis (AGE) is a common disorder that affects children worldwide. It is usually caused by viral agents, including rotavirus, enteric adenovirus, norovirus, and astrovirus groups. Currently, there are few reports about co-infection among these viruses, mainly in Brazil. This is a retrospective study in which 84 rotavirus-positive samples from hospitalized patients at a teaching hospital in Southern Brazil, collected in the 2001–2010 period, were analyzed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and reverse transcription – polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), for the investigation of enteric adenovirus, astrovirus, and norovirus. In total, 12 of the 84 (14%) samples were positive to enteric adenovirus or norovirus. Clinical, laboratory, and demographic data showed statistically significant differences between mono and co-infected patients, including age and depletion rate. These findings highlight the need for implementation of other enteric virus detection assays in clinical diagnosis for a complete laboratory investigation of hospitalized pediatric patients with AGE, in order to understand the impact of these pathogens on disease severity, spread within hospital, and consequently, prevent the dissemination of nosocomial infections.