Acute Community-Acquired Diarrhea Requiring Hospital Admission in Swiss Children

In order to ascertain the prevalence of agents that cause childhood diarrheal illness, stool specimens of 312 consecutive children with community-acquired diarrhea requiring admission were evaluated. Pathogens were detected in 166 (53%) of the 312 children (≥2 pathogens in 28 children): Rotavirus (n=75), Salmonella spp. (n=37), Campylobacter spp. (n=24), Shigella spp. (n=5), Giardia spp. (n=4), Yersinia spp. (n=2), Aeromonas spp. (n=15), Cryptosporidium (n=15), enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (n=13), enterotoxigenic E. coli (n=7), and enterohemorrhagic E. coli (n=5). In conclusion, acute childhood diarrheal illness pathogens, such as Aeromonas, Cryptosporidium, and diarrheagenic E. coli, account for a large proportion of patients with a microbiologically positive stool specimen.