Diagnostic Value of Simultaneous Measurement of Procalcitonin, Interleukin-6 and hs-CRP in Prediction of Early -Onset Neonatal Sepsis

Neonatal sepsis is a major cause of morbidities and mortalities mostly remarkable in the third world nations.We aimed to assess the value of simultaneous measurement of procalcitonin (PCT) and interleukin-6 (IL-6) in association with high sensitive- C reactive protein(hs-CRP) in prediction of early neonatal sepsis. A follow-up study was performed on 95 neonates who were below 12 hours (h) of age and had clinical signs of sepsis or maternal risk factors for sepsis. Neonates were assigned to 4 groups including "proven early-onset sepsis", "clinical early-onset sepsis", "negative infectious status", and "uncertain infectious status". Blood samples were obtained within the first 12 h of birth repeated between 24 hours and 36 hours of age for determination of serum levels of PCT, IL-6, hs-CRP, and white blood cell (WBC) count. On admission, neonates with sepsis had a higher WBC count, IL-6, PCT, and hs-CRP levels compared with those neonates without sepsis. This remained significant even after 12-24 hours of admission. Also, patients with clinical evidences of sepsis had a higher serum level of PCT and IL-6 within 12-24 hours after admission compared to the patients with uncertain sepsis. The combination of PCT and IL-6 yielded had a sensitivity of 88% and PCT and CRP (using the cutoff value of 8 mg/L) a sensitivity of 82%.The areas under the ROC curve for the two periods were 0.801, and 0.819 respectively. In final The combination of IL-6, hs-CRP, and PCT seems to be predictive in diagnosis of early onset neonatal sepsis.