Diagnostic value of blood parameters for community-acquired pneumonia

Background: Community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) has a high rate of morbidity and mortality. Blood parameters, including neutrophil, platelet, lymphocyte, monocyte, neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelet to lymphocyte ratio (PLR), and monocyte to lymphocyte ratio (MLR), have been proposed as indicators of systemic inflammation and infection. However, few studies have focused on the diagnostic value of blood parameters for CAP. Objective: The study aims to determine the diagnostic value of blood parameters for CAP and to investigate their relationship with disease severity. Methods: CAP patients who fulfilled the inclusion criteria were enrolled in this study. Healthy age- and gender-matched subjects were also enrolled as a control group. Blood parameters, blood biochemistry, C-reactive protein (CRP), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), procalcitonin (PCT), days in hospital, body temperature, pneumonia severity index (PSI), and CURB-65 were recorded. The area under the curve (AUC) values was determined using the receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curve. The correlation between the variables was tested with Pearson correlation analysis. Results: The study included 80 CAP patients and 49 healthy subjects. White blood cell (WBC), neutrophil, monocyte, MLR, PLR, and NLR levels in the CAP group were higher than that of control group, while lymphocyte and hemoglobin (HGB) levels were lower (P < 0.05). The ROC curve result showed that NLR and MLR yielded higher AUC values than other variables. Monocyte was positively correlated with ESR and negatively with body temperature, aspartate aminotransferase (AST), and creatinine (CREA). NLR was positively correlated with CRP, PCT, days in hospital, alanine aminotransferase (ALT), AST, and PSI. MLR was positively correlated with CRP, PCT, and body temperature. An increase in ALT or AST of > 2 times of normal was defined as liver injury, and CAP patients were divided into the liver normal group and liver injury group. Sixty-nine patients belonged to the liver normal group, and 11 patients belonged to the liver injury group. Blood parameters, ESR, CRP, PCT, PSI, and CURB-65 were compared between the two groups. The results demonstrated that the monocyte level in the liver injury group was lower than that of the liver normal group (P < 0.05). The ROC curve result showed that the AUC value of monocyte for liver injury was 0.838 (95% confidence interval: 0.733-0.943), which was higher than other variables. Conclusions: NLR and MLR were elevated in CAP patients, resulting in a higher diagnostic value for CAP. NLR showed a significant correlation to PSI, indicating the disease severity of CAP. Monocyte had a higher diagnostic value for liver injury in CAP patients.