Abstract:

Objective To analyze the pathogenic composition of 103 childhood patients with diarrhea in one district of Beijing in 2023，provide basic data for prevention and control of childhood diarrhea. Methods The basic information and stool samples of childhood patients with diarrhea in one district of Beijing were collected from May to October 2023. The fluorescent polymerase chain reaction（PCR） and bacterial culture were performed for common diarrhea causing bacteria，viruses，and parasites detection，and whole-genome sequencing was performed in isolates in this study. Results Totally 73 of 103 patients with childhood diarrhea were detected with at least one pathogen，with a positive rate of 70.87%. The top three bacterial pathogens were Diarrheagenic Escherichia coli（16.50%），Salmonella（9.71%），Clostridium perfringens（6.80%），while top three virus pathogens were enteric adenovirus（16.50%），norovirus（13.59%），astrovirus（8.74%），and the parasites were all negative.The detection rate of co-infection（defined as the detection result is positive with two or more pathogens in a single patient） was 31.51%. The five isolates of Aeromonas were all A. veronii，and two isolates of Cronobacter were both C. sakazakii and belonging to the ST4 type. Conclusion This study presenting a higher pathogen detection rate in childhood patients with diarrhea in one district of Beijing，and it deserves attention to co-infection in childhood patients with diarrhea，and the identification or isolation for the pathogens such as Cronobacter，Aeromonas and Campylobacter urealyticum.

Key words: Childhood diarrhea, Fluorescent polymerase chain reaction, Co-infection, Whole-genome sequencing, Average nucleotide identity, Multilocus sequence typing