Procalcitonin Serum Level in Patients Aged ۳-۳۶ Months With Focal Fever Referred to Hospitals in Western Iran in ۲۰۲۰

Background: Diagnosing viral and bacterial infectious diseases in children is of great importance. Theconventional treatment for the given diseases has been proven relatively impractical and, therefore, finding apractical diagnostic method seems necessary. Measuring procalcitonin (PCT) levels in the blood is one of thoseuseful tests which have high sensitivity and specificity compared to other methods. Moreover, many researchershave emphasized that the level of PCT in bacterial infections is significant. Therefore, PCT level measurementcan be adopted as a highly effective factor for distinguishing bacterial infections from viral ones. Our studyaimed to evaluate the plasma levels of PCT in children aged ۳-۳۶ months.Methods: In this study which was conducted in ۲۰۲۰ in Kermanshah, Iran, ۴۹ children aged ۳-۳۶ monthshaving focal fever and referring to the pediatric emergency department of Mohammad Kermanshahi and ImamReza hospitals in Kermanshah were examined. Distinguishing bacterial infection from viral one was first madeby a pediatrician using CBC diff-ESR-CRP tests.Results: The mean serum level of PCT in bacterial infections was significantly higher than that in viral infections.Furthermore, the mean of white blood cell (WBC), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and C-reactive protein(CRP) in bacterial infection was significantly higher than that in viral infection.Conclusions: According to our study findings, plasma levels of PCT could have been considered as a diagnosticindicator of the infection. Therefore, it was recommended that the evaluation of PCT plasma levels in childrenwith infection be performed in early stages of the disease. However, it was also suggested that this evaluationbe conducted after performing further investigations in this field.

Keywords:

CBC , Procalcitonin , Infection