Background Authors have studied the severity of diarrhea in patients with gastroenteritis caused by rotavirus at the Department of Pediatric Gastroenterology of the University Clinical Center of Kosova.

Material and Methodology The study is prospective and was carried for one year period. Overall 780 children were included, age 0–5. Results and their significance were brought using statistical methods.

Results 50% of the children involved in study were rotavirus positive. The majority of the children were age 0–12 months (48%). The dominant symptoms were diarrhea (94%) and vomiting (92%). The average duration of diarrhea was 3.74 days, while duration interval was 1 to 10 days. The majority of the patients in study (80%) had moderate dehydration. Only 6% in the study had minor degree of the dehydration while 14% were severely dehydrated. Greater part of the patients had isonatriemic dehydration, although there were patients with sodium in serum as low as 119 and as high as 163. The lowest pH registered was 6.9. All patients in the study were intravenously rehydrated. All patients healed with no sequels.

Conclusion Rotavirus has been found the cause of gastroenteritis in half of all cases. In the majority of our patients the diarrhea and vomiting were leading symptoms. However greater part of patients presented with moderate electrolyte disbalance and dehydration.