Necessity of human group a rotavirus vaccination in iran; an epidemiological survey in patients with acute gastroenteritis during 2017-2018

Mohammad Namayan,1,* Seyed reza mohebbi,2 Seyed masoud hosseini,3 Mahtab dehbozorgi,4 Shabnam kazemian,5 Mohammad reza zali,6

1. Research Institute for Gastroenterology & Liver Diseases, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
2. Research Institute for Gastroenterology & Liver Diseases, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
3. Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran
4. Research Institute for Gastroenterology & Liver Diseases, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
5. Research Institute for Gastroenterology & Liver Diseases, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
6. Research Institute for Gastroenterology & Liver Diseases, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Introduction

Acute gastroenteritis is one of the most common diseases all over the world. rotavirus group a (rva) is the main cause of the disease in infant and children less than 5 years of age and can lead to an estimated 352,000–592,000 deaths from severe diarrhea worldwide. actually every child in both developed and developing countries will be infected by rotavirus in the initial years of life. the frequency of rva infection is strongly related with age and also rotavirus infection show a distinguished seasonal pattern with epidemic peaks occurring predominantly in the fall and winter months of the year. the main symptoms of rva infection in children include watery diarrhea, vomiting, nausea, abdominal pain and fever. symptoms can be lead to complications like severe electrolyte imbalance, shock and death. the aim of this study is to investigate rva in tehran and karaj residents suffering from gastroenteritis complications during 2017 to 2018.

Methods

Feces samples (n=150) were collected from shahid fahmideh pediatrics hospital (south of tehran), tehran children hospital (center of tehran), taleghani educational hospital (north of tehran), vali asre polis hospital (north of tehran), shahid beheshti hospital (karaj). viral rna genome was extracted from stool specimens and cdna were prepared. all samples screened for rotavirus with primers that amplifies a section of the vp6 virus genome.

Results

Rotavirus group a was detected in 45 of 150 samples (30%). comparison of rva infection between male and female patients showed that there was not any statistically significant difference (27/82 patients, 32.93% male versus 18/68 patients, 26.47% female; p value=0.390). in addition, analyzing the age distribution of rva showed a higher frequency (20 rva infected patients) in individuals less than 2 years of age in comparison to other age groups (15 patients between 2 and 5 years, 9 between 5 and 18 and finally 1 patient older than 18 years.

Conclusion

In the present study we describe relatively high prevalence of rva in two provinces of iran (tehran and alborz provinces). rotavirus vaccination is an urgent requirement for iranian children to decrease rva infection rate and subsequently to lower down the burden of acute gastroenteritis. however, performing an extensive annual surveillance program for comprehensively determining of rva transmission routes is a necessity.

Keywords

Group a rotavirus, gastroenteritis, epidemiology, viral protein 6 gene