Diarrhea

Noroviruses, the noxious microbes that are the most common source of food poisoning on cruise ships and similar settings, are also a major cause of traveler's diarrhea among people visiting Mexico and Guatemala, researchers from Johns Hopkins University researchers reported this week in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology.

Nearly a third of the people who take antibiotics to cure an infection develop diarrhea when good bacteria in the intestines are killed off along with the bad. Some stop taking the drugs as a result, leading to problems such as failure to cure the infection or the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. But data from a large number of clinical trials compiled in a survey by researchers at the Rand Corp. show that consuming probiotics (beneficial bacteria) reduces the incidence of diarrhea by 42%. Probiotics are found at varying levels in yogurt and are also available as dietary supplements in most stores.

A Food and Drug Administration panel recommended approval of the first vaccine against the leading cause of childhood diarrhea, the Rotavirus that hospitalizes 55,000 American children a year and kills 1 million in other countries. The panel's unanimous conclusion that the vaccine is safe and works moves Wyeth-Ayerst Laboratories' RotaShield vaccine a step closer to U.S. sales. If the FDA agrees, the vaccine would be given to infants to swallow in three doses, at ages 2, 4 and 6 months.

International donors have pledged more than $4 billion this week to support vaccines for children in developing countries. Two of their primary targets? Diarrhea and pneumonia - horrible specters elsewhere in the world, much less so in this country. "For the first time in history, children in developing countries will receive the same vaccines against diarrhea and pneumonia as children in rich countries," Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Bill Gates was quoted as saying.

The world's first vaccine against the leading cause of childhood diarrhea--a virus that hospitalizes 55,000 American children each year and kills 1 million in other countries--won Food and Drug Administration approval Monday.

Two competing vaccines designed to combat rotaviral diarrhea, one of the world's leading causes of childhood death, sharply reduced severe disease and hospitalizations, according to the results of two unusually large clinical trials released Wednesday. In the developing world, widespread vaccinations would significantly decrease the 600,000 fatal cases annually of children younger than 5, experts said.

For as long as anybody can remember, doctors and nurses have suggested the BRAT diet for children suffering from diarrhea. But the diet--like the children its name connotes--should be given a time-out. The diet's name stands for the first initials of its ingredients--bananas, rice, applesauce or apple juice and toast. Doctors once thought those foods would allow the digestive tract to rest while the viral infection that commonly causes diarrhea ran its course.

The first large trial of a new vaccine against rotavirus, the most common cause of diarrhea in children, has shown that it markedly reduces illness. Rotavirus causes the hospitalization of more than 50,000 children in the United States each year, killing 100. Worldwide, the virus causes 1 million deaths per year. Dr.

Mountain climbers drawn to the icy wilderness of North America's highest peak -- 20,320-foot Mt. McKinley in Alaska -- grapple with hygiene along with high altitude. In a place where temperatures can drop to minus 40 degrees and winds often gust to 100 mph, some climbers find it easier to go to the bathroom outside their tents or just off the trail instead of wandering farther afield or bringing disposable devices.

It can kill a baby in a day, causing such swift, severe dehydration that the infant cannot even produce the tears to cry. Rotaviral diarrhea is the world's second leading killer of children 5 and younger, trailing only pneumonia. Not to be confused with the ailment that strikes travelers abroad, it is a virus that infects virtually every child on Earth. It's spread as simply as a tiny hand touching a dirty diaper, then a mouth or bottle nipple.

An antibiotic developed by a San Diego firm received a government panel's backing as a treatment for diarrhea caused by increasingly common bacterial infections often acquired in hospitals and nursing homes. The panel of outside experts convened by the Food and Drug Administration voted 13 to 0 that fidaxomicin, marketed under the trade name Dificid by Optimer Pharmaceuticals Inc., is safe and effective in combating symptoms associated with Clostridium difficile , also known as C. diff . The unanimous vote endorsed the FDA's preliminary findings and increases the chances that the agency will approve fidaxomicin.

For most of us living in the developed world, diarrhea is an uncomfortable nuisance -- not a life-threatening event. But each year for more than a million children under the age of 5, it is a killer. It's known that a few simple precautions and treatments can make a difference and save a child. What's been unknown, say researchers led by Christa Fischer Walker of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, is whether providing those interventions makes a difference on a large scale, cutting disease and death rates around the globe.

For an abscessed tooth, I was given an antibiotic called clindamycin. Ever since I took it, I have had unremitting diarrhea. My dentist wants me to see a gastroenterologist. Please make an appointment with a gastroenterologist immediately. Clindamycin can trigger dangerous diarrhea by allowing bad bacteria called Clostridium difficile (C. diff) to flourish. We don't want to worry you, but this condition could be lethal if left untreated.

In its quest to genetically engineer rice with human genes to produce a treatment for childhood diarrhea, tiny Ventria Bioscience has made an astonishing number of powerful enemies spanning the political spectrum. Environmental groups, corporate food interests and thousands of farmers across the country have succeeded in chasing the company's rice farms out of two states.

A week before your trip to Mexico, the express mail van drops off a small package that might just save your vacation. You open it carefully and dial the number listed on the instruction sheet. The nurse who answers gives you instructions on how to prepare, then drink the vaccine that's just been delivered. You stir it into a flavored beverage and drink it, hoping it will protect you from traveler's diarrhea. That scenario may sound like fantasy but could be closer to reality than you think.

A key federal advisory panel Tuesday recommended that all infants receive a vaccine against the most common form of diarrhea in children. The vaccine, called RotaTeq, has been shown to prevent life-threatening cases of diarrhea caused by the rotavirus. It is an oral vaccine, administered in three doses. The advisory panel to the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that infants receive their first dose by 12 weeks and all three doses by 32 weeks.

A week before your trip to Mexico, the express mail van drops off a small package that might just save your vacation. You open it carefully and dial the number listed on the instruction sheet. The nurse who answers gives you instructions on how to prepare, then drink the vaccine that's just been delivered. You stir it into a flavored beverage and drink it, hoping it will protect you from traveler's diarrhea. That scenario may sound like fantasy but could be closer to reality than you think.

Developing nations need to adopt simple, proven methods of preventing diarrhea and malnutrition, which kill an estimated 7 million children each year, delegates to an international congress said. Malnutrition is linked to nearly 60% of the deaths of children younger than 5, mostly in Asia and Africa. Diarrhea is responsible for an additional 20% of the deaths.