Does leucocytosis identify bacterial infections in febrile neonates presenting to the emergency department?
Objective: This study was undertaken to evaluate the discriminatory power of the peripheral white blood cell (WBC) count to identify bacterial infections in a cohort of febrile neonates (≤28 days of age) presenting to an emergency department. Methods: Retrospective medical record review using descriptive statistics and a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. Neonates who presented to a tertiary care paediatric emergency department between 1 January 1999 and 22 August 2002, had a temperature ≥38°C, underwent lumbar puncture, and had a WBC count obtained were included. They were divided according to microbiological and radiographic findings into four groups: bacterial infections, viral infections, pneumonia, and negative sepsis evaluations. Results: A total of 69 febrile neonates met the inclusion criteria. The number of neonates in each group was as follows: 8 with bacterial infections, 10 with viral infections, 3 with pneumonias, and 48 with negative sepsis evaluations. There
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- Does leucocytosis identify bacterial infections in febrile neonates presenting to the emergency department?
