Declines in case management of diarrhoea among children less than five years old.

Declines in case management of diarrhoea among children less than five years old In the January 2007 Bulletin, Forsberg et al. present an elegant analysis of the trends in diarrhoea case management using data from national Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) from 1986 to 2003. 1 They conclude that despite global efforts to promote appropriate diarrhoea management during this time, only slow progress has been made in the proportion of children treated with oral rehydration salts (ORS), recommended home fluids (RHF) or increased fluids. The proportion of children given continued feeding during diarrhoea episodes actually decreased. Forsberg et al. examined trends in diarrhoea management over all DHS surveys conducted from 1986 to 2003. Since the time horizon of their analysis encompasses the late 1980s and early 1990s, when national and global Control of Diarrhoeal Disease programmes were quite active, and the period in the second half of the 1990s when these transitioned into