title: Effects of Racecadotril on Weight Loss and Diarrhea Due to Human Rotavirus in Neonatal Gnotobiotic Pigs (Sus scrofa domesticus).
abstract: Diarrheal disease is the second leading cause of death in children younger than 5 y, and the most common cause of acute watery diarrhea in young children worldwide is rotaviral infection. Medicines to specifically reduce diarrhea would be a desirable adjunctive treatment to supportive fluid therapy to decrease the mortality rate of diarrheal diseases. In this study, we evaluated the efficacy of an antisecretory drug, racecadotril, in treating human rotavirus (HRV)-induced diarrhea in a neonatal gnotobiotic pig model. In total, 27 gnotobiotic pigs were randomly assigned (n = 9 per group) to receive either racecadotril, chlorpromazine (positive-control drug), or PBS (mock treatment) after inoculation with HRV. Pigs were weighed daily and rectal swabs were collected to determine fecal consistency scores and virus shedding. Rotaviral infection was confirmed by ELISA and cell culture immunofluorescence. Overall, the racecadotril-treated pigs had less severe illness than either the chlorpromazine- or mock-treated groups; this conclusion was supported by the lower fecal-consistency scores, shorter duration of diarrhea, and significant gain in body weight during the course of the study of the racecadotril-treated pigs. Through its influence on decreasing intestinal hypersecretion, racecadotril was better able to control the clinical signs of rotaviral infection in the gnotobiotic pigs. These results lend support for using racecadotril as a treatment for rotaviral diarrhea.
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Tammy
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Bui
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Guohua
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Inyoung
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Ke
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Wen
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Erica L
authors.initials: EL
authors.lastname: Twitchell
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Shaoh
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hualei
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Ashwin K
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Ramesh
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Mariah D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Weiss
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Xingdong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: Departments of Large Animal Clinical Sciences, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia.
authors.forename: Sherrie G
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Glark-Deener
authors.affiliation: PATH, San Francisco, California.
authors.forename: Robert Km
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Choy
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, Virginia;, Email: lyuan@vt.edu.
authors.forename: Lijuan
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Yuan
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000930:Antidiarrheals / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D003967:Diarrhea / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000821:virology; D004353:Drug Evaluation, Preclinical; D012401:Rotavirus; D012400:Rotavirus Infections / Q000188:drug therapy*; D034421:Sus scrofa; D015244:Thiorphan / Q000031:analogs & derivatives* / Q000627:therapeutic use; D015431:Weight Loss / Q000187:drug effects
chemical_list: D000930:Antidiarrheals; C049331:racecadotril; D015244:Thiorphan