Evaluation of oxidative stress tests in patients diagnosed with renal colic in the emergency department of Ankara Ataturk training and research hospital, Turkey

To investigated oxidative stress changes in renal colic patients, and to determine its role in differential diagnosis of renal colic. The cross-sectional study was conducted at Ankara Atatürk Training and Research Hospital, Turkey, from June 2012 to December 2012 and comprised patients with complaints suggesting of renal colic and diagnosed with urinary stone. Healthy individuals were enrolled to form the control group. The patients and the control group were evaluated in terms of oxidative stress parameters. SPSS 17 was used for statistical analysis. Of the 83 subjects, 50[60%] were patients with renal colic, while 33[40%] were healthy controls. Among the patients, 25[50%] were men and 25[50%] were women. Among the controls, there were 17[51.5%] men and 16[48.5%] women. No statistically significant difference was found between the two groups in terms of age and gender [p>0.05]. Likewise, no statistically significant difference was found between the oxidative stress indexes of the two groups [p>0.05]. There was no significant increase in oxidative stress in patients with renal colic. The result may help in the differential diagnosis of patients with abdominal pain

Diagnostic value of lactate levels in acute appendicitis

To assess the value of lactate measurements in addition to standard diagnostic measurement of white blood cell count [WBC] and C-reactive protein [CRP] in the accuracy of preoperative acute appendicitis [AA] diagnosis. A total of thirty-six consecutive patients with histopathologically confirmed acute appendicitis were retrospectively included in the study. Fifteen volunteers were included as control group. Patient characteristics, preoperative ultrasonography [US] and laboratory assessment including WBC, C-reactive protein [CRP] and lactate values were collected. Receiver Operator Characterstics [ROC] curves for discriminant values and sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values [PPV.NPV] were calculated. The male/female ratio of groups 1 and 2 were 25/11 and 9/6 respectively. Mean age: 34.13 +/- 9.6 years. Area under ROC values for lactate were found significant and discriminant value was found to be 8 mg/dl. Specificity, sensitivity, PPV and NPV calculated for lactate were as follows: 53%, 80%, 77% and 57%. Increased lactate levels as well as other inflammatory parameters should be considered as a diagnostic parameter in diagnosis of AA