[Acute dehydration in infant]

Dehydration in infant under the age of one year, even more under six months old, due to viral diarrhoea in most cases, is particularly risky. Management of dehydration consists in rehydrating and maintaining nutritional needs. The key to choosing the right treatment is to assess dehydration gravity according to weight loss, expressed in percentages of body weight before dehydration, which can be tough or impossible to obtain. So, clinical signs like impairment of general aspect, lengthening of cutaneous recoloration time, persistent cutaneous crease, hollow eyes, mucous membranes dryness or tear lack, with tachycardia, arterial pressure and diuresis, can help in diagnosing dehydration gravity. Treatment is based on correcting extracellular area deficit. In severe cases, it is possible to treat with 20 ml/kg of isotonic cristalloide solute intravenously (dehydration greater than 10%). In all other cases, the technique mostly used is oral rehydration, aimed for correcting hydrical deficit in four hours, which has proved to be efficient, secure and fast. It consists in using rehydration solutes fitting specific criteria. Using them precociously allows most efficient prevention of acute forms.