Umbilical cord blood serum procalcitonin concentration in the diagnosis of early neonatal infection.

摘要

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate serum procalcitonin concentration in umbilical cord blood for diagnosis of intrauterine bacterial infection. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A prospective study was conducted between 2000 and 2001. Serum procalcitonin concentrations were evaluated in 187 umbilical cord blood samples. Five groups have been defined: controls A (n=37), full-term noninfected B1 (n=80) and infected neonates B2 (n=8), preterm noninfected C1 (n=38) and infected C2 (n=24) newborns. An immunoluminometric assay was used to determine procalcitonin concentration. The Mann-Whitney U-test and Spearman's correlation ratio were applied. The sensitivity and specificity, the positive and negative predictive values, and the area under receiver operating characteristic curves were calculated. RESULTS: A statistically higher serum procalcitonin concentration was found in the preterm infected group (p<0.005; C2 vs A and C1). CONCLUSION: Serum procalcitonin concentration in umbilical cord blood may be a useful parameter in the diagnosis of early neonatal infection.