[Risk factors for persistent diarrhea in infants].
BACKGROUND
Persistent diarrhea is a multicausal disease. The analysis of risk factors for persistent diarrhea includes environmental and biological variables as well as therapeutical management.


OBJECTIVE
To identify risk factors for persistent diarrhea among children hospitalized with acute diarrhea.


METHODS
This is a case-control study. The sample consisted of 212 infants under 24 months, hospitalized with acute diarrhea, at the "Instituto Materno-Infantil de Pernambuco", Recife, PE, Brazil. Cases were infants with persistent diarrhea and controls those with acute diarrhea. Cases and controls were compared to a series of socio-economic, biological and clinical variables, previous morbidities and therapeutic management prior to hospital admission. Unadjusted and adjusted odds ratio were used with the respective 95% confidence intervals. It was adopted the level of significance of 5%. Logistic regression analysis was conducted to control for potential confounding factors.


RESULTS
The risk of persistent diarrhea was higher for infants with: dysentery, fever at the onset of diarrhea, fasting and taking antibiotics prior to hospital admission. The variables that showed the highest adjusted odds ratios for persistent diarrhea were infants living in households without refrigerator and perianal hyperemia at hospital admission.


CONCLUSIONS
The improvement of environmental conditions and an adequate clinical management of diarrhea for hospitalized infants may contribute to the reduction of diarrhea morbidity.
Lins
Maria das Graças Moura
Md
Departamento Materno-Infantil, Centro de Ciências da Saúde, Universidade Federal de Pernambuco. gracame@hotlink.com.br
Motta
Maria Eugênia Farias Almeida
ME
da Silva
Giselia Alves Pontes
GA
D000208:Acute Disease; D001004:Anus Diseases / Q000150:complications; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D003968:Diarrhea, Infantile / Q000209:etiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006940:Hyperemia / Q000150:complications; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D012034:Refrigeration; D012307:Risk Factors; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors