Evaluation of Optimal Antibiotic Use in Children with Gastroenteritis Abstract

Introduction: Due to the side effects of overuse of antibiotics, the aim of study was to evaluate the optimal antibiotic use in children with gastroenteritis. Methods: This descriptive-analytical study was conducted on 178 children with gastroenteritis from January to December 2018. Data including age, gender, clinical symptoms and laboratory findings were extracted from records. Results: Out of 178 cases of diarrhea, 32 cases were due to bacteria and 146 cases were due to viruses. The most clinical symptoms in the patients were fever (34.40 %), vomiting (33.2 %) and coryza (13.1%). The most frequency of viral (46.2%) and bacterial diarrhea (32.2%) were seen in autumn season. Antibiotics were used mostly in spring (39 %) and autumn (25 %) seasons. In 14% of cases, the appropriate treatment was not selected. In addition, 50.56 % of treated children were less than 1 years old. No significant relation was also seen between season with bacterial or viral cases (p>0.05). Significant relation was seen between taking antibiotics at admission and clinical signs such as abdominal pain and suspicious food (p<0.01). Data were analyzed throgh SPSS, version16. Chi Square test was used for analysis of data Conclusion: Virus is the main cause of diarrhea in children with gastroenteritis. Moreover, the most frequency of diarrhea was seen in autumn and spring season. However, there was no significant relation between seasons with bacterial and viral cases. It indicates that bacterial and viral diarrhea was not affected by season. For preventing microbial resistance, antibiotic therapy should be administered more carefully in children with diarrhea.