Retrospective Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Virology. Nov 12, 2015; 4(4): 372-376
Published online Nov 12, 2015. doi: 10.5501/wjv.v4.i4.372
Prevalence of adenovirus and rotavirus infection in immunocompromised patients with acute gastroenteritis in Portugal
Joana Ribeiro, Delfim Ferreira, Célia Arrabalde, Sandra Almeida, Inês Baldaque, Hugo Sousa
Joana Ribeiro, Célia Arrabalde, Sandra Almeida, Inês Baldaque, Hugo Sousa, Virology Service, Portuguese Institute of Oncology of Porto, 4200-072 Porto, Portugal
Joana Ribeiro, Delfim Ferreira, Hugo Sousa, Molecular Oncology and Viral Pathology Group, Portuguese Institute of Oncology of Porto, 4200-072 Porto, Portugal
Joana Ribeiro, Research Department, Portuguese League Against Cancer (Liga Portuguesa Contra o Cancro - Núcleo Regional do Norte), 4200-177 Porto, Portugal
Author contributions: Almeida S and Baldaque I performed the experimental tests for Adv and RV detection; Ribeiro J, Ferreira D, and Arrabalde C were responsible for the data collection; Ribeiro J and Sousa H analyzed data; Ribeiro J and Ferreira D wrote the paper; Sousa H supervised the study; all authors have provided the final approval of the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All authors declare no conflicts of interest with any competing financial interest for the work described in this paper.
Data sharing statement: Not applied.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Hugo Sousa, MD, PhD, Virology Service, Portuguese Institute of Oncology of Porto, Rua Dr. António Bernardino Almeida, 4200-072 Porto, Portugal. hugomls@gmail.com
Telephone: +351-22-5084000 Fax: +351-22-5084001
Received: May 8, 2015
Peer-review started: May 9, 2015
First decision: June 3, 2015
Revised: September 9, 2015
Accepted: September 29, 2015
Article in press: September 30, 2015
Published online: November 12, 2015
Abstract

AIM: To characterize the prevalence of rotavirus (RV) and adenovirus (AdV) infections in immunocompromised patients with acute gastroenteritis.

METHODS: The presence of RV and AdV (serotypes 40 and 41) was evaluated in 509 stool samples obtained between January 2009 and December 2010 from 200 immunocompromised patients (83 females and 117 males; median age 21 years old, range 0-72. The diagnosis of infection was performed as a routine procedure and the presence of RV and AdV (serotypes 40 and 41) was determined by immunochromatography using the RIDA® Quick Rota-Adeno-Kombi kit (r-Biopharm, Darmstadt, Germany). The data analysis and description of seasonal frequencies were performed using computer software IBM® SPSS® (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) Statistics version 20.0 for Mac. The frequencies of infection were compared into different age and gender groups by χ2 test.

RESULTS: The study revealed 12.4% AdV positive samples and 0.8% RV positive samples, which correspond to a prevalence of 6.5% and 1.5%, respectively. AdV was more frequent between October 2009 and April 2010, while RV was identified in April 2010 and July 2010. The stool analysis revealed that from the 509 samples, 63 (12.4%) were positive for AdV and 4 (0.8%) positive for RV, which by resuming the information of each patient, lead to an overall prevalence of AdV and RV of 6.5% (13/200 patients) and 1.5% (3/200 patients), respectively. The stratification of the analysis regarding age groups showed a tendency to an increased prevalence of infection in paediatric patients between 0-10 years old. Considering the seasonal distribution of these infections, our study revealed that AdV infection was more frequent between October 2009 and April 2010, while RV infection was characterized by two distinct peaks (April 2010 and July 2010).

CONCLUSION: The overall prevalence of AdV and RV infection in immunocompromised patients with acute gastroenteritis was 8% and AdV was the most prevalent agent.

Keywords: Viral gastroenteritis, Adenovirus, Rotavirus, Immunocompromised host, Stool samples

Core tip: Acute gastroenteritis has been associated with significant rates of morbidity and mortality among immunocompromised patients. Rotavirus (RV) and adenovirus (AdV) are described as common agents of viral gastroenteritis causing acute diarrhoea. This is the first study in Portugal to characterize the prevalence and seasonal features of RV and AdV infections in immunocompromised patients with acute gastroenteritis. Results revealed 12.4% AdV positive samples and 0.8% RV positive samples, which correspond to a prevalence of 6.5% and 1.5%, respectively. Our results also demonstrate the importance of to add more screening methods for other emergent enteric viruses, in order to avoid the morbidity and mortality of the immunocompromised patients.