C-REACTIVE PROTEIN AS A PREDICTOR OF INFECTIONS.

Corresponding Author:
Dr. Deepali Danave,
Department of Microbiology,
Dr. Vaishampayan Memorial Government Medical College, Solapur.
E-mail:milliondollarbaby@rediffmail.com

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND

C-reactive protein (CRP) is a plasma protein of the pentraxin family and an acute phase reactant, which displays high sensitivity as a general inflammation marker. CRP testing has been employed in the detection of a variety of conditions as infections, myocardial infarction, sepsis, necrosis and trauma.

The objective of the study is to investigate the impact of routine CRP ordering on clinical decision-making in hospitalised febrile children and neonates with suspected neonatal sepsis and adult patients with infections.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

During two months period, 153 such clinically diagnosed cases of infections were referred for CRP testing. Blood samples were collected from these patients and sent to the laboratory for detection of CRP. Sera were separated and subjected to latex agglutination test. Testing was carried out as per manufacturer’s instructions. Positive or negative status of the samples for CRP was reported. The test kits used were Immun-Star CRP (Latex slide test) by Star Diagnostics Pvt. Ltd. Mumbai, India.

RESULTS

In our study, 24.18% (37 samples) tested positive for CRP out of 153 samples (Table 1). There was no significant difference in the sex-wise distribution of positive samples (Table 2). But the positivity was very high in paediatric age group (86.48%) as compared to adults (13.51%; Table 3). Maximum referrals for CRP testing were obtained from NICU, PICU, Paediatric wards (Table 4).

CONCLUSION

We conclude that routine CRP ordering for diagnostic purposes for infections fails to inform decision-making in the majority of cases and it only leads to inflated hospital bills.

Keywords

C-reactive Protein, Neonatal, Paediatric Infections.