© 2004 BMJ Publishing Group Ltd & Association of Clinical Pathologists
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Relation between lymphopenia and bacteraemia in UK adults with medical emergencies
1 Nuffield Departments of Medicine, University of Oxford, John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford OX3 9DU, UK
2 Nuffield Department of Clinical Laboratory Sciences, University of Oxford, John Radcliffe Hospital
Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
D H Wyllie
Nuffield Department of Clinical Laboratory Sciences, John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford OX3 9DU; david.wyllie{at}ndcls.ox.ac.uk
Aims: To determine the relevance of lymphopenia to the diagnosis of bacteraemia in patients admitted with medical emergencies, relative to peripheral blood white cell count and neutrophilia.
Patients/Methods: A two year cohort study carried out in a teaching hospital in Oxford, UK of 21 495 consecutive adult emergency admissions to general medical or infectious disease wards. Full blood data were available in 21 372 cases; 41 cases with extreme full blood count results (neutrophil count, > 75 x 109/litre; lymphocyte count, > 10 x 109/litre) were excluded, leaving 21 331 cases for analysis. The association between the admission lymphocyte and neutrophil counts and the risk of bacteraemia was assessed.
Results: Neutrophilia and lymphopenia were both associated with bacteraemia. Lymphopenia was the better predictor in this cohort. Both neutrophilia and lymphopenia were more predictive of bacteraemia than the total white blood cell count.
Conclusions: Both lymphocyte and neutrophil counts, rather than total white blood cell count, should be considered in adult medical admissions with suspected bacteraemia.
Abbreviations: AUC, area under the curve; HIV, human immunodeficiency virus; ROC, receiver operating characteristic; WBC, white blood cell count
Keywords: lymphopenia; blood cell count; sensitivity and specificity; bacteraemia
![]()
CiteULike
Complore
Connotea
Del.icio.us
Digg
Reddit
Technorati What's this?
This article has been cited by other articles:
-
Maeda, K., Baba, Y., Nagai, Y., Miyazaki, K., Malykhin, A., Nakamura, K., Kincade, P. W., Sakaguchi, N., Coggeshall, K. M.
(2005). IL-6 blocks a discrete early step in lymphopoiesis. Blood
106: 879-885
[Abstract] [Full Text] -
Wyllie, D H, Bowler, I C J W, Peto, T E A
(2005). Bacteraemia prediction in emergency medical admissions: role of C reactive protein. J. Clin. Pathol.
58: 352-356
[Abstract] [Full Text]
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
