Vesikari Score (Gastroenteritis Episode Severity)
The Vesikari clinical severity score (Ruuska and Vesikari 1990) grades a whole episode of acute gastroenteritis across seven items for a total of 0 to 20: below 7 is mild, 7 to 10 moderate, and 11 or more severe.
Open the calculator → Runs in your browser. Data leaves only if you deliberately send a problem report from the interactive tool.
Example
- Duration of diarrhea
- 1
- Maximum diarrheal stools in 24 hours
- 2
- Duration of vomiting
- 2
- Maximum vomiting episodes in 24 hours
- 2
- Maximum temperature, as a rectal-equivalent reading
- 1
- Dehydration, as percentage of body weight lost
- 0
- Treatment
- 1
Result: Vesikari 9 of 20: moderate.
The tool opens with these values already filled in. Replace them with your own.
What the result means
- Temperature
- A rectal-equivalent reading. Add about 1 F for an oral or tympanic route and 2 F for axillary before banding.
- Below 7
- Mild.
- 7 to 10
- Moderate.
- 11 or more
- Severe.
- Scope
- Grades the whole episode in retrospect, not current dehydration, and is not a triage tool.
What you enter
- Duration of diarrhea
- Maximum diarrheal stools in 24 hours
- Duration of vomiting
- Maximum vomiting episodes in 24 hours
- Maximum temperature, as a rectal-equivalent reading
- Dehydration, as percentage of body weight lost
- Treatment (one item, not two)
Full field descriptions
- Duration of diarrhea [0 - none; 1 - 1 to 4 days; 2 - 5 days; 3 - 6 days or more]
- Maximum diarrheal stools in 24 hours [0 - none; 1 - 1 to 3; 2 - 4 to 5; 3 - 6 or more]
- Duration of vomiting [0 - none; 1 - 1 day; 2 - 2 days; 3 - 3 days or more]
- Maximum vomiting episodes in 24 hours [0 - none; 1 - 1; 2 - 2 to 4; 3 - 5 or more]
- Maximum temperature, as a rectal-equivalent reading [0 - below 37.1 C; 1 - 37.1 to 38.4 C; 2 - 38.5 to 38.9 C; 3 - 39.0 C or above]
- Dehydration, as percentage of body weight lost [0 - none; 2 - 1 to 5 percent; 3 - 6 percent or more]
- Treatment (one item, not two) [0 - none; 1 - rehydration; 2 - hospitalization]
How this is calculated
- Scoring
- Five items score 0 to 3. Dehydration scores 0, 2, or 3 with no 1-point row. Treatment is one item scoring 0 to 2, not two.
Ruuska T, Vesikari T. Rotavirus disease in Finnish children: use of numerical scores for clinical severity of diarrhoeal episodes. Scand J Infect Dis. 1990;22(3):259-267. Read the source ↗
A reference and educational tool. Not medical, legal, or financial advice, and not a substitute for clinician judgment.