Sepsis Biomarkers In Early Onset Neonatal Infections: A Review

The septic response is an extremely complex chain of events involving inflammatory and anti-inflammatory processes, humoral and cellular reactions and circulatory abnormalities (1, 2). The diagnosis of sepsis and evaluation of its severity is complicated by the highly variable and non-specific nature of the signs and symptoms of sepsis (3). However, the early diagnosis and stratification of the severity of sepsis is very important, increasing the possibility of starting timely and specific treatment (4, 5). Biomarkers can have an important place in this process because they can indicate the presence or absence or severity of sepsis (6, 7), and can differentiate bacterial from viral and fungal infection, and systemic sepsis from local infection. With this background in mind, we reviewed the literature on sepsis biomarkers that have been used in clinical or experimental studies to help better evaluate their utility.