Relationship between serum procalcitonin level and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

Background: Differentiation of the etiologies of acute exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (AECOPD) and differential diagnosis of other causes of respiratory attacks in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients are challenging. Serum procalcitonin (PCT) which is a biomarker of bacterial infection, but not viral infections, could possibly recognize AECOPD requiring antibiotic treatment from other etiologies of respiratory attack. Methods: Patients aged from 40–80 years who were diagnosed with COPD according to the GOLD criteria and who referred to the Imam Khomeini Hospital of Ahvaz in 2016 were divided into two groups of exacerbated and stable COPD. Exacerbation of COPD is defined as worsening of the patient's condition from the stable state and behind normal day-to-day variations that is acute in onset and may necessitate treatment in a patient with underlying COPD. BODE Index and 6MWDT were used to assess the patients, and the severity of their disease was determined based on the GOLD criteria. Subsequently, PCT testing using electrochemiluminescence (ECL) method was carried out on patients on the same day. Results: PCT level in the exacerbation group was 0.272 ± 0.586 and 0.066 ± 0.027 in the non-exacerbation group, and their difference was statistically significant with P value = 0.001. Based on the results, the cut point of differentiating between the AECOPD and the stable groups with a sensitivity of 68% and a specificity of 80% is 0.085. Conclusion: Overall, the findings of this study indicate that PCT levels could be regarded as a good diagnostic marker for patients with COPD, and for the differentiation of AECOPD patients from stable COPD patients

Association of erythrocyte sedimentation rate and C-reactive protein and clinical findings with HLA-DQ8 allele in Rheumatoid Arthritis patients

Background ― Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an inflammatory, autoimmune disease induced by certain auto-antigens. HLA-DRB1*0401 allele has a significant relationship with RA incident. Additionally, DQβ1*0301, *302(DQ8), *303, and *304 can increase RA risk especially in DQA1*0301 and *302 coincident. Recent studies suggest that distribution of this allele is different in various populations Material and Methods ― 70 patients and 70 healthy controls were analyzed for human leukocyte antigen (HLA) allele by specific primer-polymerase chain reaction (SSP-PCR) method. Patients were evaluated in terms of ESR and CRP. Data analysis was performed in SPSS V.17. Results ― HLA-DQ8 allele was significantly more frequent in RA patients compared to control (P<0.0001). However, no significant relationship was observed between increased ESR (P=0.527), CRP (P=0.505), and mean counts of arthritic (P=0.691) and tender joints (P=0.669) among the patients who were carriers of HLA-DQ8. Conclusion ― There is a significant association between RA and HLA-DQ8 allele, this allele can increase susceptibility to RA. These findings might relate to the ethnical variations of RA patients but we couldn’t find a significant association between CRP and ESR with HLA-DQ8. We recommend to add specific inflammatory markers to CRP as well as assess ESR in larger sample sizes to obtain accurate results