DIAGNOSTIC ROLE OF PRESEPSIN AND PROCALCITONIN IN CHILDREN (1–60 MONTHS OF AGE) WITH BACTERIAL AND FUNGAL SEPSIS

The objective of this study was to evaluate the diagnostic efficacy of presepsin and Procalcitonin and to compare their roles infungal and bacterial sepsis. This study was conducted from August 2019 to March 2021 in the PICU and EmergencyDepartment of S.N. Medical College, Agra. Children aged 1–60 months with clinical features of sepsis were included in thestudy. Of the total 73 participants, 52 (71.23%) were cases of sepsis, including blood culture-positive cases (n=26) and casessuspected of having sepsis based on laboratory or clinical findings but with negative blood cultures (n=26), while 21 (28.77%)were controls. At the selected cut off values, the sensitivity, specificity, PPV, and NPV for PCT were 82.69%, 90.48%, 95.56%,and 67.86%, respectively. For presepsin, these values were 88.46%, 95.24%, 97.87%, and 76.92%, respectively, indicatingoverall better diagnostic performance than PCT. The sensitivities of presepsin and Procalcitonin in blood culture-positive caseswere 96.15% and 92.30%, respectively. The greatest increase in Procalcitonin values was observed in Gram-negative cases,followed by Gram-positive cases. The increase in Procalcitonin levels was greater in bacterial sepsis than in fungal sepsis. Thegreatest increase in presepsin values among culture-positive isolates was observed in fungal cases, followed by Gram-negativecases, and was lowest in Gram-positive cases.