Bacterial superinfection in upper respiratory tract infections estimated by increases in CRP values: A diagnostic follow-up in primary care

A new turbidimetric method for assaying serum C-reactive protein based on phosphocholine interaction

“…In the district hospitals of these countries, due to resource-limited health care systems, patients suffering from fever are often treated empirically with antibiotics based on clinical suspicion only and without any benefit of laboratory evidence for bacterial infection. Since responses to CRP occur more frequently in bacterial compared with viral infections (2,(6)(7)(8), and values drop rapidly after recovery or treatment, measuring and charting serum CRP may contribute to the diagnosis and management of infectious diseases and other inflammatory conditions.…”

Administering intravenous immunoglobulin during infection is associated with infusion reactions in selected patients

“…The increase in CRP values in patients who reacted was often relatively low, suggesting the presence of either a minor bacterial infection, or a viral respiratory tract infection [9,10].…”

Feasibility of using C-reactive protein for point-of-care testing

“…The most common disease conditions studied was RTI (83%; n = 10). Half of the studies (50%; n = 6) were performed for lower RTI compared to the other 3 that included both upper and lower RTI [4,5,13] while one study focused only on upper RTI [17]. Of the lower RTI, two articles specifically examined acute cough illness [10,11], and one included pneumonia [12].…”

“…Of the nine studies that had shown CRP POCT to be effective, the majority of them assessed reduction in the prescription of antibiotics as an outcome (67%; n = 6). The three remaining studies [2,12,17] found CRP POCT to be effective in diagnosing infection. None of the studies recommended the use of CRP POCT alone to diagnose infection and prescribe antibiotics.…”

“…However; there were four studies that showed CRP POCT to be useful in facilitating decision-making [1,2,4,11]. Support for specific use of CRP POCT exists in more than half of the studies (58%; n = 7) [1,2,4,6,12,17,18].…”