RESUMO
BACKGROUND: Human enteroviruses are one of the major causes of central nervous system (CNS) infections in pediatrics. STUDY DESIGN: We have studied 1242 children under 15 years old with suspicion of CNS infection from January 1998 to December 2003. CSF was obtained and molecular typing of human enterovirus B serotypes was performed by RT-PCR and sequencing of the N-terminal part of VP1 gene. RESULTS: According to the clinical syndromes, patients were grouped as aseptic meningitis (n=654, 52.6%), encephalitis (n=239, 19.2%), febrile seizures (n=153, 12.3%), febrile infant (n=84, 6.7%), neonatal disease (n=70, 5.6%),), acute flaccid paralysis (n=31, 2.4%) and acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (n=11, 0.9%). HEV was detected in 335/1242 CSF samples (26.97%) and was associated to aseptic meningitis (n=243, 72.5%); febrile infant (n=31, 9.2%); neonatal infection (n=26, 7.7%); encephalitis (n=25, 7.5%), febrile seizures (n=9, 2.68%); acute flaccid paralysis (n=1, 0.3%). Seasonal incidence of HEV-B species was analyzed showing that in Buenos Aires infections occur mainly during late spring and summer. Molecular serotyping was completed in 60/335 samples. Echovirus 30, Echovirus 9, Coxsackie B3 to B5 and Echovirus 33 were the most frequently identified. CONCLUSIONS: We showed that HEV are responsible for a considerable proportion of hospitalizations in children with central nervous system compromise reaching 27% of overall etiology.
