One hundred and three children aged from 1 month to 5 years were asses
sed for human rotavirus (HRV) infection over a 5-week period at the Ch
ildren's Hospital, Bangkok. HRV was present in 18% and adenovirus in 1
0.7% of the children with gastro-enteritis. None of the controls excre
ted HRV. Vomiting and dehydration were significantly associated with H
RV diarrhoea. A comparison of the reliability of the detection methods
showed the following sensitivities: RNA-polyacrylamide gel electropho
resis (PAGE) 90%, electron microscopy (EM) 84% and Rotascreen latex pa
rticle agglutination (LPA) 80%. PAGE and EM were 100% specific while t
he Rotascreen LPA was 81% specific. Rotascreen LPA gave 15.5% false po
sitive results. Of the HRV positive samples analyzed by PAGE, 5.3% and
94.7% were of subgroups I and II, respectively. The ID enzyme immunoa
ssay and PAGE are reliable and inexpensive methods which can be recomm
ended for HRV detection, particularly in areas with little technical s
upport.