Clinical predictors for Legionella in patients presenting with community-acquired pneumonia to the emergency department.
BMC Pulm Med
; 9: 4, 2009 Jan 19.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-19152698
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
Legionella species cause severe forms of pneumonia with high mortality and complication rates. Accurate clinical predictors to assess the likelihood of Legionella community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) in patients presenting to the emergency department are lacking.METHODS:
We retrospectively compared clinical and laboratory data of 82 consecutive patients with Legionella CAP with 368 consecutive patients with non-Legionella CAP included in two studies at the same institution.RESULTS:
In multivariate logistic regression analysis we identified six parameters, namely high body temperature (OR 1.67, p < 0.0001), absence of sputum production (OR 3.67, p < 0.0001), low serum sodium concentrations (OR 0.89, p = 0.011), high levels of lactate dehydrogenase (OR 1.003, p = 0.007) and C-reactive protein (OR 1.006, p < 0.0001) and low platelet counts (OR 0.991, p < 0.0001), as independent predictors of Legionella CAP. Using optimal cut off values of these six parameters, we calculated a diagnostic score for Legionella CAP. The median score was significantly higher in Legionella CAP as compared to patients without Legionella (4 (IQR 3-4) vs 2 (IQR 1-2), p < 0.0001) with a respective odds ratio of 3.34 (95%CI 2.57-4.33, p < 0.0001). Receiver operating characteristics showed a high diagnostic accuracy of this diagnostic score (AUC 0.86 (95%CI 0.81-0.90), which was better as compared to each parameter alone. Of the 191 patients (42%) with a score of 0 or 1 point, only 3% had Legionella pneumonia. Conversely, of the 73 patients (16%) with > or =4 points, 66% of patients had Legionella CAP.CONCLUSION:
Six clinical and laboratory parameters embedded in a simple diagnostic score accurately identified patients with Legionella CAP. If validated in future studies, this score might aid in the management of suspected Legionella CAP.
Texto completo:
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Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Pneumonia
/
Doença dos Legionários
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Infecções Comunitárias Adquiridas
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Serviço Hospitalar de Emergência
Tipo de estudo:
Observational_studies
/
Prognostic_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Limite:
Aged
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Aged80
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Female
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Humans
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Male
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Middle aged
Idioma:
En
Revista:
BMC Pulm Med
Ano de publicação:
2009
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Suíça