Positive serology for dengue viral infection in pediatric patients with Kawasaki disease in southern Thailand.

BACKGROUND The etiologic agent of Kawasaki disease (KD) is unknown, but may be dengue infection because of reported cases of concomitant KD and dengue. METHODS AND RESULTS Prospective study was conducted to ascertain the relationship of positive serology for dengue infection in pediatric patients presenting with KD. A total of 65 cases were diagnosed with KD during the period of 4 years and of the 48 who had a complete dengue serologic study, 9 had a positive dengue titer. CONCLUSION In the present study 18.7% of patients had proven dengue infection from a positive serologic study. Further case-control study with other pediatric patients presenting with acute febrile illness needs to be done to support this significant finding.