Role of cereal-based oral rehydration therapy in persistent diarrhoea in children

A total of 2000 children aged under five and 12,500 diarrhoea episodes were studied prospectively for assessing the efficacies of R-ORS and G-ORS and for comparing them with that of a comparison area using drugs for treatment. Efficacy was evaluated in terms of ORS use rate, consumption of ORS per episode, duration of diarrhoea and rate of recovery. The data were analysed to compare the rate of persistent diarrhoea in the three areas. Mean ORS consumption was 946 +/- 576 and 1236 +/- 766 ml per episode of watery diarrhoea in the R-ORS and G-ORS areas respectively. The mean durations of watery diarrhoea were 3.3 +/- 2.1, 5.4 +/- 3.5 and 8.8 +/- 5.5 days in the R-ORS, G-ORS and comparison area, respectively. The median durations for dysentery were 7, 9 and 12 days in the three areas respectively. The incidences of persistent diarrhoea following water diarrhoea were 0.4, 3 and 12% in the R-ORS, G-ORS and comparison area respectively, and, following dysenteric episodes, 8, 18 and 40%. The results of the study suggest that R-ORS can hasten recovery from both watery diarrhoea and dysenteries, thus reducing the incidence of persistent diarrhoea.