Study of the Predictive Value of Neutrophil/Lymphocyte Ratio in Diagnosis of COVID-19 Infection | ||
| The Egyptian Journal of Hospital Medicine | ||
| Article 24, Volume 94, Issue 1, January 2024, Pages 161-171 PDF (640.96 K) | ||
| DOI: 10.21608/ejhm.2024.334499 | ||
| Abstract | ||
| Background: Early diagnosis of COVID-19 infection can prevent the lethal clinical course of the disease and result -instead- in a better outcome. Thus, there was an urging need for rapid and simple laboratory tests for early prediction of infection that will eventually improve morbidity and mortality of the disease. Objective: The study aimed toassessthe predictive value of neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio in the diagnosis of COVID-19 infection in terms of sensitivity and specificity. Patients and methods: In this retrospective study, we analyzed the clinical data of 150 participants divided into three equal groups; 50 patients with a positive reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) oronasopharyngeal swab for SARS-CoV-2 (Group I), 50 patients with non-COVID-19-related fevers and/or respiratory illness (negative swab and CT chest) (Group II) and 50 healthy controls (Group III). Results: There was a high statistically significant difference between the studied groups regarding absolute neutrophil count, absolute lymphocyte count, NLR, CRP and serum ferritin. In this study there was a significant correlation between NLR and CRP while, there were no significant correlations between NLR and other parameters like BMI, heart rate, Hb, platelet count and serum ferritin. Thus, the NLR can be considered as a dependable predictor of COVID-19 infection at a cutoff point of more than 3.06 with sensitivity 61% and specificity 86% Conclusion: NLR could be a useful, cheap, simple marker for early prediction of patients infected with COVID-19 with cutoff point more than 3.06. NLR could be used as a dependable risk predictor in the diagnosis of COVID-19 infections apart from its cut-off point. | ||
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