A new study conducted in Malawi examining results of different diagnostic tests for rotavirusin children with and without diarrhoea will help scientists to determine the burden of this important disease.

Rotavirus is the commonest cause of severe diarrhoea in children in Malawi, and results in hundreds of deaths each year.

Between September 2012 and September 2013, researchers collected and used stool samples from 146 children with diarrhoea and 65 children without the disease from the households across Blantyre district and tested them for rotavirus using polymerase chain reaction (PCR), and another test called an ELISA which looks for rotavirus protein in the stool.