Molecular epidemiology of nosocomial rotavirus infection.

Desikan, P; Daniel, J D; Kamalarathnam, C N; Mathan, M M

The molecular epidemiology of nosocomial rotavirus infection in children admitted to the paediatric ward of a large hospital in southern India was studied by transmission electron microscopy and RNA electrophoresis on stool samples. Six hundred and twenty-six samples were collected and rotaviruses were detected in 35 of them. A predominant electropherotype was found in all the samples, and there was no seasonal variation in the incidence of infection. The predominant electropherotype pattern in this study was different from the electropherotype patterns of strains isolated elsewhere in the country and also from the pattern of the strains isolated earlier from children with acute diarrhoea at the same hospital.