Evaluation of procalcitonin as a contribution to antimicrobial stewardship in SARS-CoV-2 infection: a retrospective cohort study

  1. E.J. Williams
  2. L. Mair
  3. T.I. de Silva
  4. D.J. Green
  5. P. House
  6. K. Cawthron
  7. C. Gillies
  8. J. Wigfull
  9. H. Parsons
  10. D.G. Partridge

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Abstract

No abstract available

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  1. Version published to 10.1016/j.jhin.2021.01.006
  2. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.06.29.20136572: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board Statementnot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    All statistical analyses were performed in Stata version 16.1 (StataCorp 2019.
    StataCorp
    suggested: (Stata, RRID:SCR_012763)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    Numerous metrics exist for the measurement of antibiotic consumption, each with their own strengths and weaknesses [21]. World Health Organisation Defined Daily Doses have the advantage that they are standardised and, at institution level, can be assessed from procurement records without recourse to individual prescribing data. They do, however, have several drawbacks. They do not factor in exposure equivalent dose adjustments such as those that occur in renal or liver dysfunction, and combination therapy results in elevation of the DDDs received which may correlate poorly with relative effects on host ecology and adverse consequences of therapy. Finally, they are based on usual prescribing patterns and therefore markedly different DDD may apply to different settings or routes of administration of the same drug [36]. This latter weakness was addressed in our study through the use of the parenteral DDD for those drugs where there was a difference. We also assessed days of treatment (DOT), which may be a more relevant metric from a stewardship perspective and again this was found to be significantly lower in the negative PCT group. We also demonstrated a 3-fold increase in the odds of carbapenem prescription in those with a positive PCT. This is important in the context of the increasing global incidence of carbapenemase-producing Enterobacteriales and is likely to be a direct consequence of increased initial antibiotic usage and a concern that this had induced resistance leadi...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.06.29.20136572v1 on medRxiv