ArticleJournal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society2022
The Role of C-Reactive Protein as a Triage Tool for Pulmonary Tuberculosis in Children.
Article in Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
17 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 22 citations in OpenAlex.
- Host blood protein biomarkers to screen for tuberculosis disease: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Journal of clinical microbiology · 2024Pooled it
- Head-to-head evaluation of host blood biomarkers for point-of-care TB triage: diagnostic accuracy study.Journal of clinical microbiology · 2026Article
- Escaped surveillance: tuberculosis masked by severe hyponatremia in an immunocompromised patient: a case report.Journal of medical case reports · 2026Article
- Association between serum lysyl oxidase-like 2 and chitinase-3-like protein 1 levels and Mycobacterium tuberculosis drug resistance in children with pulmonary tuberculosis.BMC pediatrics · 2026Observational
- C-Reactive Protein for Pulmonary Tuberculosis Screening and Treatment Response Monitoring in Children.Open forum infectious diseases · 2026Article
- Clinical prediction model of Mycoplasma pneumoniae pneumonia combined with influenza virus infection in pediatric patients in Gansu, China.BMC infectious diseases · 2026Article
- From gaps to progress: five-year global advances in the diagnosis of pediatric tuberculosis.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2026Review
- Assessment of some hematological and inflammatory parameters among patients with active pulmonary tuberculosis in Ibb governorate, Yemen.BMC infectious diseases · 2025Article
- Exploring non-sputum biosignatures for tuberculosis triage and diagnosis in children living with HIV.Expert review of molecular diagnostics · 2025Review
- Diagnostic accuracy of point-of-care triage tests for pulmonary tuberculosis using host blood protein biomarkers: a systematic review and meta-analysis.EClinicalMedicine · 2025Article
- Advances on Electrochemiluminescent Biosensors for TB Biomarkers.ACS sensors · 2025Review
- Closing the gaps in childhood TB detection.IJTLD open · 2025Article
- Pediatric Tuberculosis: A Review of Evidence-Based Best Practices for Clinicians and Health Care Providers.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- The accuracy of point-of-care C-Reactive Protein as a screening test for tuberculosis in children.PLOS global public health · 2024Article
- Acute phase proteins and IP-10 in plasma for tuberculosis diagnosis.Frontiers in tuberculosis · 2023Article
- B and T lymphocyte attenuator as a C-reactive protein and IgA associated auxiliary diagnostic marker for pulmonary tuberculosis: a case-control study.Annals of translational medicine · 2022Article
- The Quest for a Child-Friendly Tuberculosis Triage Test.Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society · 2022Article
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Authors and funding
16 authors at 6 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundC-reactive protein (CRP) has shown promise as a triage tool for pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) in adults living with the human immunodeficiency virus. We performed the first assessment of CRP for TB triage in children.
methodsSymptomatic children less than 15 years old were prospectively enrolled in Kampala, Uganda. We completed a standard TB evaluation and measured CRP using a point-of-care assay. We determined the sensitivity and specificity of CRP to identify pulmonary TB in children using 10 mg/L and 5 mg/L cut-off points and generated a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve to determine alternative cut-offs that could approach the target accuracy for a triage test (≥90% sensitivity and ≥70% specificity).
resultsWe included 332 children (median age 3 years old, interquartile range [IQR]: 1-6). The median CRP level was low at 3.0 mg/L (IQR: 2.5-26.6) but was higher in children with Confirmed TB than in children with Unlikely TB (9.5 mg/L vs. 2.9 mg/L, P-value = .03). At a 10 mg/L cut-off, CRP sensitivity was 50.0% (95% confidence interval [CI], 37.0-63.0) among Confirmed TB cases and specificity was 63.3% (95% CI, 54.7-71.3) among children with Unlikely TB. Sensitivity increased to 56.5% (95% CI, 43.3-69.0) at the 5 mg/L cut-off, but specificity decreased to 54.0% (95% CI, 45.3-62.4). The area under the ROC curve was 0.59 (95% CI, 0.51-0.67), and the highest sensitivity achieved was 66.1% at a specificity of 46.8%.
conclusionsCRP levels were low in children with pulmonary TB, and CRP was unable to achieve the accuracy targets for a TB triage test.
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