Detection of procalcitonin (PCT) in healthy controls and patients with local infection by a sensitive ILMA.

Abstract Procalcitonin (PCT) is an established marker for severe systemic bacterial infection and sepsis. So far the relevance of PCT in healthy individuals or patients with local infections is unclear due to the lack of highly sensitive assays. The aim of our study was the characterization of a new sensitive PCT assay, the establishment of reference values and the assessment of diagnostic accuracy. We assessed PCT values in 522 patients with different infectious and non infectious conditions and 410 healthy controls by a new coated tube sandwich chemiluminescence assay B.R.A.H.M.S ProCa-S (2 step assay, time to result 2.5 hours). The lower detection limit was 6.0 ng/L, with a functional assay sensitivity below 7 ng/L. Samples above 250 ng/L gave excellent correlation to the LUMItest PCT (r = 0.98, p