Diagnosis and Management of Dysentery in Children Attending National Hepatology and Tropical Medicine Research Institute

Background: Dysentery is one of the main causes of morbidity and mortality among children especially in developing countries, several enteric pathogens are responsible. Diagnosis is made by taking personal history, clinical and laboratory examinations. Management is maintained by using rehydration therapy, ant parasitic, antiviral and antimicrobial therapy. Objective: The study was conducted to determine the prevalence of enteric pathogens causing dysentery in children and risk factors. Methodology: Stool samples were collected from children with dysentery, samples were examined by direct smear, formalin ether, modified ZN, copro antigens, culture /sensitivity and Rota virus antigen tests. Results: Pathogens were isolated from 77.8% samples with higher rate of parasites 35.6% than bacteria 21.7% or Rota virus 3.9%. Most common parasite was G. lamblia (22.2%). E.coli was the most frequent bacterial pathogens (42.0%). watery diarrhea was higher in children > 5 years old (20.7%) than children <5 years old (17.4%) specially in parasitic cases (25.7%), hepatomegaly was (7.2% ) in > 5 years old , parasites and Rota virus were higher in boys (40.9%, 5.7%) than in girls (30.4%, 2.2%) while bacterial was higher in girls (28.3%) than in boys (14.9%) respectively. All sociodemographic data was insignificantly different except for insanitary water supply. Conclusion: This study provides update information about the prevalence of the enteric causative agents in children dysentery. We recommended awareness about prevention, improvement hygiene status and proper medications to reduce the disease. More strategies about risk factors are needed to develop recent controlling methods.