Respiratory syncitial virus in children with acute respiratory infections.

Objective. To study the nutritional status of children with Respiratory Syncitial virus infection. Methods. One hundred and twenty six children with acute respiratory infection, between the age of 4-24 months, were investigated for RSV infection with bronchiolitis, pneumonia and upper respiratory tract infection. Nasopharyngeal aspirates were collected and cytokine responses were determined by ELISA. Upper respiratory tract infections were detected in 16.66%, bronchiolitis in 30.15% and Pneumonia in 53.17% children. Results. Of the 126 patients, 46.66% children were positive for RSV while 58.33% were negative for RSV. Children with bronchiolitis were more commonly positive for RSV compared to URTI and pneumonia. RSV was almost equally distributed among boys (42.5%) and girls (48.7%). More children were RSV positive when the mean age lesser (8.4 mo) was compared to RSV negative (9.93 mo). Well nourished children and children with normal birth weight had more RSV positives, though not statistically significant. In a sub sample analysis of cytokines done (n=25), Interleukin-2 and Interleukin-8 levels were higher in the RSV positive children and these levels declined after 5 days of illness. Conclusions. RSV is more commonly associated with bronchiolitis in younger infants with normal birth weight or more weight for age (WFA). Proinflammatory cytokine IL-8 was secreted at high concentrations in the nasopharyngeal aspirate in all the children.

Occurrence of campylobacter species in healthy well-nourished and malnourished children

The occurrence of Campylobacter species in healthy, well-nourished and healthy, malnourished children of low socioeconomic level in Southern Chile was determined. Campylobacter carriers were significantly most frequent among malnourished (31.4 percent) than among well-nourished (9.9 percent) children. Six species were isolated from malnourished children whereas four were found among well-nourished children. C. upsaliensis was the most frequent (13.3 percent) species isolated from malnourished children, followed by C. lari (7.6 percent) and C. fetus ssp. fetus (1.9 percent).

A ocorrência de espécies de Campylobacter em crianças mal nutridas e bem nutridas, sem diarréia e de baixo nível socioeconômico, foi determinada. Os portadores de Campylobacter foram mais freqüentes entre as crianças mal nutridas (31,4 por cento) do que entre as crianças bem nutridas (9,9 por cento). Seis espécies de Campylobacter foram isoladas das crianças mal nutridas e quatro das crianças bem nutridas. C. upsaliensis foi a espécie mias freqüentemente isolada (13,3 por cento) das crianças mal nutridas, seguida de C. lari (7,6 por cento) e C. fetus ssp. fetus (1,9 por cento).