Procalcitonin measurement for detection of serious bacterial infection in febrile children: comparison between two automated immunoassays - Lacroix, L.; Manzano, S.; Galetto, A.; Gervaix, A. (Clin Biochem, 2012)
OBJECTIVES: To assess the concordance of procalcitonin values at 3 cut-off ranges in a cohort of pediatric samples presenting with fever without source, using two different automated immunoassays. DESIGN AND METHODS: 65 frozen samples from children presenting with fever without source were thawed, tested on both Kryptor and VIDAS systems, and compared using a regression analysis, a Bland-Altman difference plot, and analysis of concordance at the clinically relevant cut-off points. RESULTS: Kryptor and VIDAS PCT results correlated remarkably well (r=0.952), with no significant difference in the frequency distribution over the 3 cut-off ranges (p=0.1384). The strength of the agreement was good (kappa=0.759) with an overall concordance of 84.6%. CONCLUSION: Correlation and concordance of PCT values measured by both systems were good. This finding allows clinical implementation of both techniques with the same nominal PCT cut-off values for detection of serious bacterial infection in children presenting with fever without source.
Keywords: journalArticle; Bacterial Infections/*diagnosis; Calcitonin Gene-Related Peptide; Calcitonin/*blood; Child, Preschool; Cohort Studies; Fever/pathology; Humans; Immunoassay/*methods; Infant; Protein Precursors/*blood; Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic; Reagent Kits, Diagnostic; Regression Analysis; Reproducibility of Results