Infectious causes of childhood disability: results from a pilot study in rural Bangladesh.

PURPOSE To identify the contribution of infectious aetiologies to major childhood disabilities in Bangladesh. METHODS Active community-based survey was conducted for severe childhood disability using the Key Informants Method between September 2011 and March 2012 in a rural sub-district of Bangladesh. RESULTS We screened 1069 children and identified 859 with severe disabilities. The mean age of the disabled children was 8.5 year and 42.9% were girls. The major forms of impairments/conditions were cerebral palsy (n = 324, 37.7%), hearing impairment (n = 201, 23.4%), physical impairment (n = 147, 17.1%), visual impairment (n = 49, 5.7%), cerebral palsy with epilepsy (n = 39, 4.5%) and epilepsy (n = 41, 4.7%). Congenital rubella syndrome was identified in 1.1% (n = 9). 7.1% disabilities resulted from clinically confirmed infections, and another 10.8% originated from probable infections; thus a total of 17.9% disabilities were related to an infectious origin. CONCLUSIONS Infectious diseases appear to be one of the major causes of severe childhood disability in rural Bangladesh.