Effect of Fecal Contamination on Diarrheal Illness Rates in Day-care Centers

Contact spread of enteropathogens in day-care centers is supported by the recovery (presence vs. absence) of fecal coliforms from hands and day-care center fomites. This prospective study was conducted to determine what, if any, quantitative measures of fecal coliforms predict the risk of diarrhea among day-care center attendees. Diarrheal illness without concomitant respiratory symptoms was monitored among 221 children aged < 3 years in 37 classrooms (24 day-care centers) through biweekly parental telephone interviews from October 1988 to May 1989 in Cumberland County, North Carolina. The risk of diarrhea was expressed as new episodes/classroom-fortnight. Contamination was expressed as the log10 fecal coliform count per unit of surface area, per toy, and per child and staff hands. Significant predictors of diarrheal risk were any hand contamination (p = 0.003) and the number of contaminated moist sites (hands, faucets, and sinks) (p = 0.006). After adjusting for the child/staff ratio using weighted multiple regression, the authors found that classrooms with either any hand contamination (p = 0.0015) or contamination on all moist sites (p = 0.015) had a significant twofold increased rate of diarrhea compared with classrooms without contamination. This was the first study to demonstrate an increased risk of diarrhea associated with fecal contamination and the frequent sink contamination in day-care centers.