Searching the Human Herpes virus 6 and 7 (PCR) In CSF of Children Admitted In Pediatric Ward of Rasoul Hospital, Tehran, Iran

Background and Objectives: Meningoencephalitis in Iranian children is frequent, but encephalitis is rare .The frequency of HHV-6 and HHV-7 in central nervous system diseases of our children is unclear. The aim of this study was searching the DNA-s of HHV-6 & HHV-7 in CSF samples of children with meningoencephalitis Materials and Methods: A cross sectional study (2007-2009) was done in Pediatric Ward in Rasoul Hospital, Tehran Iran. Totally, 150 CSF samples obtained from children (1-180 months) with meningoencephalitis. Conventional and BACTEC Ped Plus medium, latex agglutination tests were used for ruling out the bacterial causes. We searched the DNA-s of HHV-6 & HHV-6 quantitatively by Real time - PCR in 150 CSF samples obtained from children with meningoencephalitis. Results: 60.7 % of cases were male. Fever was reported ( > 38.5) in 74%; irritability in 70%; Convulsion was seen in 53% of cases. Herpes virus was detected in 12% (18/150) of cases. Both HHV-6 & HHV-7 were found in 6% of all cases. HHV-6 DNA was detected in 4.7% (6) and HHV-7 DNA was detected in 2 cases (1.4%) without any correlation to age, sex and clinical signs. HHV-6 was slightly more frequent than HHV-7. Conclusion: Our data indicate that herpes viruses are not uncommon causes in children with meningoencephalitis. The incidence was lower than other references.