Post-infectious functional gastrointestinal disorders in children after a non-severe dengue episode without warning signs.

Introduction: The pathogenesis of functional gastrointestinal disorders involves infectious agents such as viruses. Objective: To study the development of functional gastrointestinal disorders 3, 6, 9 and 12 months after an episode of non-severe dengue without warning signs in children. Materials and methods: We conducted a cohort study in 73 children diagnosed with non-severe dengue without warning signs at Hospital Universitario del Valle “Evaristo García” and 62 healthy children from Cali, Colombia. Using the Questionnaire for Pediatric Gastrointestinal Symptoms Rome III (QPGS-III) in Spanish we identified functional gastrointestinal disorders 3, 6, 9, and 12 months after non-severe dengue without warning signs. Measurements of central tendency, relative risk, chi square, and Fisher’s exact test were performed, with p<0.05 being significant. Results: We included 135 children who were 10.7±1.9 years old; 51.1% of them were male and 19.3% had a functional gastrointestinal disorder (9.6% of them had abdominal pain related to functional gastrointestinal disorders). There was a greater risk to present a functional gastrointestinal disorder and related abdominal pain in children after non-severe dengue without warning signs at 3, 6, 9, and 12 months of follow-up, but without significant differences. Conclusion: Our study suggests that non-severe dengue without warning signs does not increase the risk of functional gastrointestinal disorders and related abdominal pain for up to 12 months of follow-up.