ABSTRACT
Objective:To establish the biology reference interval (RI) of peripheral blood procalcitonin (PCT) for children between 3 days and 6 years old in China.Methods:Totally 3 353 reference individuals with apparent health or no specific diseases were recruited in 18 hospitals throughout the country during October 2020 to May 2021. Reference individuals were divided into four groups: 3-28 days, 29 days - 1 year, 1-3 years and 4-6 years. Vein blood or capillary blood were collected by percutaneous puncture from every reference individual. The PCT level in serum and the capillary whole blood were assayed by Roche Cobas e601 and Norman NRM411-S7 immunoanalyzer. Outliers were deleted and 95th percentiles of every group were provided as RIs. Man-Whitney U test or Kruskal-Wallis test were used performed to assess the difference among different gender, age or method groups. Results:The difference of PCT distribution between male and female is not statistically significant, but the difference between serum and capillary whole blood is statistically significant. The differences between age groups are significant too. For Roche e601, serum PCT RI of 3-28 days group is <0.23 μg/L, 29 days - 6 years are <0.11 μg/L. For NRM411, Serum PCT RI of 3-28 days group is <0.21 μg/L, 29 days - 1 year: <0.09 μg/L, 1 - 6 years: <0.10 μg/L. For whole blood PCT, RI of 3-28 days group is <0.26 μg/L, 29 days - 6 years is <0.15 μg/L.Conclusions:Serum and capillary whole blood PCT have different RIs, however, capillary whole blood PCT testing is valuable in pediatric application. Children in 3-28 days show higher PCT levels than other age group. To establish the RIs and understand the differences among different groups are essential for the interpretation and clinical application of peripheral blood PCT testing results.
ABSTRACT
Objective To investigate the pathogens distribution in neonatal blood culture and their drug resistance to antibacteri‐al drugs in Dalian City .Methods The routine blood culture ,identification and drug sensitivity test were carried out in the hospital‐ized neonates from August 2014 to August 2015 .And the obtained data were analyzed .Results A total of 186 strains of pathogenic bacteria were detected from 1 570 cases of neonatal blood culture and the positive rate was 11 .8% .Gram positive bacteria accounted for 74 .2% (138/186) and were dominated by Staphylococcus epidermidis .Gram negative bacteria accounted for 25 .3% (47/186) , which were mainly onion burkholderia bacterium .One strain was fungus ,accounting for 0 .5% .The drug sensitivity test results showed that Gram positive bacteria had the higher resistance rate to penicillin and erythromycin (80 .0% -90 .0% ) ,100 .0% sensi‐tivity to vancomycin ,linezolid and teicoplanin ;E .coli and K .pneumoniae had the highest resistance rate to ampicillin (88 .2% -100 .0% ) ,100 .0% sensitivity to imipenem ,amikacin ,low resistance rate to piperacillin/tazobactam ,cefoperazone/sulbactam ,amoxi‐cillin/clavulanic acid ,cefepime and ceftazidime (0% -10 .0% ) .The resistance rate of onion burkholderia bacterium to ticarcillin/clavulanate and meropenem was higher than 80 .0% ,which had 100 .0% sensitivity to cefoperazone /sulbactam ,levofloxacin ,mino‐cycline and compound sulfamethoxazole .Conclusion The neonatal blood culture pathogen in Dalian City is dominated by Gram pos‐itive bacteria ,coagulase negative staphylococcus is the main pathogen .Due to the different regional environmental ,pathogens and drug resistance should be regularly monitored and analyzed to provide objective and accurate basis for clinical rational use of anti‐bacterial drugs .