S. Endsley et A. Galbraith, ARE YOU OVERLOOKING ORAL REHYDRATION THERAPY IN CHILDHOOD DIARRHEA - ITS NOT JUST FOR USE IN DEVELOPING-COUNTRIES, Postgraduate medicine, 104(4), 1998, pp. 159
In 1978, Lancet declared that development of effective oral rehydratio
n solutions might prove to be the most important medical advance of th
e century. Since then, according to estimates of the World Health Orga
nization, use of the solutions has saved a million children a year wor
ldwide. Why, then, has this method of treating diarrhea-induced dehydr
ation been so overlooked in the United States, where several hundred c
hildren still die annually of effects of diarrhea? One reason, the aut
hors believe, is that physicians in developed countries have only limi
ted exposure to serious dehydration and so are poorly informed on the
principles of intervention. The authors provide practical advice on as
sessing dehydration in children, providing initial and maintenance reh
ydration, and reinstituting feeding.