Study of Procalcitonin as a Biomarker and Its Correlation with Total Leucocyte Count in Patients with Sepsis

Introduction Bacterial sepsis is a common cause of morbidity and mortality in admitted patients and should receive prompt antibiotic treatment for better outcome. Fever can also be caused by noninfectious causes such as autoimmune diseases, malignancy, drugs, venous thromboembolism. Markers of systemic inflammation, such as CRP, erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) have proven to be of limited utility due to their poor sensitivity and specificity for bacterial infection. Blood culture which is considered as the gold standard for diagnosing bacterial infection has a drawback in the form of a long turnaround time. Aim of the study: This study is aimed to evaluate the levels of procalcitonin (PCT) and its correlation with total leucocyte count (TLC) in adults presenting with features suggestive of sepsis. Methods: It is an observational study conducted in a zonal hospital in eastern part of India.50 patients admitted with clinical diagnosis of sepsis were included. Patients already on treatment with antibiotics were excluded from the study. Correlation between procalcitonin level and total leucocyte count were studied using appropriate statistical tools. Results: Moderate positive correlation was found between TLC and procalcitonin (R: 0.458) and was statistically significant with a P value of 0.0008. Procalcitonin was found to be positive in all patients while TLC remained within normal range in 15 patients. Conclusion Procalcitonin can be used as an early biomarker for sepsis. PCT also gave an idea regarding the severity of infection. Moderate positive correlation was found between TLC and procalcitonin and was statistically significant.