Participation of allergic factors in chronic diarrhoea aetiology in children in the first three years of life – our observations

Introduction: Chronic diarrhoea, especially in infants and small children, is a difficult clinical problem because of its various causes.
Aim: The aim of the study was to estimate the frequency of occurrence of chronic diarrhoea in children in the first three years of life and to evaluate the role of allergic factors in aetiology of chronic diarrhoea.
Material and methods: 652 children aged 0 to 36 months with chronic diarrhoea were retrospectively analysed. These patients were treated in the 2nd Department of Paediatrics and Allergology and the Gastroenterological Outpatient Clinic of our Institute during the last 16 years and constituted 2.6% of all patients. Infants were the biggest group (47.3%) of all examined children. Children in the third year of life were the smallest group (15.8%).
Results: Analysis of causative factors showed that chronic diarrhoea was mainly caused by infectious diseases of the digestive tract (39.9%). The next most common causes were allergic diseases (38.2%) followed by primary and secondary enzymatic deficiencies (9.9%) and non-specific factors (9.2%). Other causes were considerably rarer. Causes of chronic diarrhoea were also analysed according to the years of observation. This analysis showed that allergic factors are of increasing importance and infection is becoming less important.
Conclusions: Allergic diseases are an important aetiological factor of chronic diarrhoea in children in their first years of life. It was found that the role of allergy as a causative factor of chronic diarrhoea has still been increasing during the particular years of observation.