Molecular Diagnosis of Human Adenovirus in Children with Upper Respiratory Tract Infections

Upper respiratory tract infections (URTIs) that are caused by human adenoviruses (HAdVs) affect in the whole population, but are more frequent in young children under the age of five years old. Due to the potential role of HAdVs in the URTIs cases of young children and there is no previous molecular study on these viruses in Iraq, this study aimed to detect of the prevalence of HAdVs in children suffering from URTIs by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The DNA extracted from 203 nasopharyngeal and throat swabs, they were collected from children aged less than 15 years with the respiratory illness. In addition to 30 swabs obtained from healthy children as a control group. All samples diagnosed with PCR technique by using specific primer for the seven hyper variable regions (HVR-7) in the hexon gene. The results showed that 57 (28.08%) were positive and 146 (71.9%) were negative for HAdVs. The statistical analysis revealed a significant difference between groups (X 2 = 11.064; P<0.01), where the viral DNA was detected in approximately a third (28.08%) of the total study groups. Again results of our study showed that most patients with HAdV infection were younger than 5 years (85.5%). Moreover, the results showed no significant difference in prevalence of HAdVs infections between males 29.82% (34/114) and females 25.84% (23/89). In conclusion, using multiplex PCR for identify of multiple viral infections in the same time with highly sensitively.