ABSTRACT
The pupose of this study is to verify the role of urinary sodium in transient renal acidification defect which frequently combine acute infantile gastroenteritis. We studied on twenty-five infants, 2month to 36 month of age, during the 4 month period, from August, 1991 to December, 1991. The patients had acidosis for a mean of 3 days and sixty urine samples were collected during this period. The mean pH of 23 rine samples with sodium concentration<10 mmol/L was significantly higher than pH of 37 samples with sodium concentration<10 mmol/L, We separately analyzed 15 urine samples collected during metabolic acidosis after completion. of rehydration. The result was that a urinary acidification defent was observed in the urine samples with low sodium concentration but not in the sodium rich samples. We concluded that impaired urinary acidification defect is frequently during metabolic acidosis in infants with acute gastroenteritis and results from a sodium deficit rather than from transient distal renal tublur acidosis.