Nutritional status and diarrhoeal pathogen in hospitalized children in Bangladesh.

We studied the relationship between nutritional status and infection due to specific enteropathogens in young children with diarrhoea. Overall, 26% of the children were severely underweight, 27% were severely wasted and 19% were severely stunted. Children with Shigellae and V. cholerae O1 were significantly more severely underweight, wasted and stunted than those with rotavirus diarrhoea (p < 0.0001). Our results indicate that an effective nutrition programme for young children might have greater impact on diarrhoeal illness caused by Shigella and V. cholerae than by rotavirus diarrhoea.