A systematic review and meta-analysis of the global seasonality of norovirus.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Noroviruses are the most common cause of acute gastroenteritis across all ages worldwide. These pathogens are generally understood to exhibit a wintertime seasonality, though a systematic assessment of seasonal patterns has not been conducted in the era of modern diagnostics.

Methods

We conducted a systematic review of the Pubmed Medline database for articles published between 1997 and 2011 to identify and extract data from articles reporting on monthly counts of norovirus. We conducted a descriptive analysis to document seasonal patterns of norovirus disease, and we also constructed multivariate linear models to identify factors associated with the strength of norovirus seasonality.

Results

The searched identified 293 unique articles, yielding 38 case and

SUBMITTER: Ahmed SM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3788804 | biostudies-literature | 2013

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature