SynthesisInfluenza and other respiratory viruses2013
Can procalcitonin tests aid in identifying bacterial infections associated with influenza pneumonia? A systematic review and meta-analysis.
Synthesis in Influenza and other respiratory viruses, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 43 citations in OpenAlex.
- Diagnostic accuracy of point-of-care tests for acute respiratory infection: a systematic review of reviews.Health technology assessment (Winchester, England) · 2026Pooled it
- Procalcitonin for diagnosis of bacterial pneumonia in critically ill patients during 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic: a prospective cohort study, systematic review and individual patient data meta-analysis.Critical care (London, England) · 2014Pooled it
- Diagnostic and Prognostic Roles of Procalcitonin and Other Tools in Community-Acquired Pneumonia: A Narrative Review.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- The Role of Procalcitonin as an Antimicrobial Stewardship Tool in Patients Hospitalized with Seasonal Influenza.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- A new model for predicting the outcome and effectiveness of drug therapy in patients with severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome: A multicenter Chinese study.PLoS neglected tropical diseases · 2023Article
- The Role of Biomarkers in Influenza and COVID-19 Community-Acquired Pneumonia in Adults.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- Evaluation of Procalcitonin's Utility to Predict Concomitant Bacterial Pneumonia in Critically Ill COVID-19 Patients.Journal of intensive care medicine · 2022Article
- Low Levels of Procalcitonin Are Related to Decreased Antibiotic Use in Children Hospitalized Due to Influenza.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Antibiotic Prescriptions in Hospitalized Patients with an Exacerbation COPD and a Proven Influenza or RS Virus Infection.International journal of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease · 2022Article
- Exclusion of bacterial co-infection in COVID-19 using baseline inflammatory markers and their response to antibiotics.The Journal of antimicrobial chemotherapy · 2021Article
- Increased antimicrobial resistance during the COVID-19 pandemic.International journal of antimicrobial agents · 2021Review
- Host Diagnostic Biomarkers of Infection in the ICU: Where Are We and Where Are We Going?Current infectious disease reports · 2021Review
- Predictive risk score model for severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome mortality based on qSOFA and SIRS scoring system.BMC infectious diseases · 2020Article
- Community-acquired bacterial pneumonia in adults: An update.The Indian journal of medical research · 2020Review
- Clinical Practice Guidelines by the Infectious Diseases Society of America: 2018 Update on Diagnosis, Treatment, Chemoprophylaxis, and Institutional Outbreak Management of Seasonal Influenzaa.Clinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America · 2019Article
- Biomarkers of Community-Acquired Pneumonia: A Key to Disease Diagnosis and Management.BioMed research international · 2019Review
- Progression of whole-blood transcriptional signatures from interferon-induced to neutrophil-associated patterns in severe influenza.Nature immunology · 2018Article
- Diagnosing Viral and Atypical Pathogens in the Setting of Community-Acquired Pneumonia.Clinics in chest medicine · 2017Review
- [Community-acquired pneumonia: Focus on viral CAP].Revue des maladies respiratoires actualites · 2016Article
- Host Biomarkers for Distinguishing Bacterial from Non-Bacterial Causes of Acute Febrile Illness: A Comprehensive Review.PloS one · 2016Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo summarize evidence for the diagnostic accuracy of procalcitonin (PCT) tests for identifying secondary bacterial infections in patients with influenza.
methodsMajor databases, including MEDLINE, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library, were searched for studies published between January 1966 and May 2009 that evaluated PCT as a marker for diagnosing bacterial infections in patients with influenza infections and that provided sufficient data to construct two-by-two tables.
resultsSix studies were selected that included 137 cases with bacterial coinfection and 381 cases without coinfection. The area under a summary ROC curve was 0·68 (95% CI: 0·64-0·72). The overall sensitivity and specificity estimates for PCT tests were 0·84 (95% CI: 0·75-0·90) and 0·64 (95% CI: 0·58-0·69), respectively. These studies reported heterogeneous sensitivity estimates ranging from 0·74 to 1·0. The positive likelihood ratio for PCT (LR+ = 2·31; 95% CI: 1·93-2·78) was not sufficiently high for its use as a rule-in diagnostic tool, while its negative likelihood ratio was reasonably low for its use as a rule-out diagnostic tool (LR- = 0·26; 95% CI: 0·17-0·40).
conclusionsProcalcitonin tests have a high sensitivity, particularly for ICU patients, but a low specificity for identifying secondary bacterial infections among patients with influenza. Because of its suboptimal positive likelihood ratio and good negative likelihood ratio, it can be used as a suitable rule-out test but cannot be used as a standalone rule-in test.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.