Prognostic Value of the Lipocalin Marker in Children with COVID-19

Objective — to study the prognostic value of the lipocalin marker for complicated COVID-19 in children. Materials and methods. We conducted a cohort, observational, retrospective study involving 88 pa­­tients aged 1 month to 18 years with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 by PCR. The children were hospitalised in the Kyiv City Children’s Clinical Infectious Disease Hospital, Kyiv, Ukraine. According to the course of the disease, patients were divided into the main and control groups. The main group included 42 patients with a complicated course of COVID-19, and the control group included 46 patients with an uncomplicated course of the disease. During a comprehensive examination of patients during the first day of hospitalisation, blood serum was collected for further examination of lipocalin levels by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. We used the «Human Neutrophil Gelatinase-associated Lipocalin», NGAL kit (BT-LabKit, China) with a working measurement range of 5—600 ng/ml and a sensitivity of 2.01 ng/ml. The study used statistical, analytical methods and an empirical research method. To calculate the results obtained, we used the statistical program «Statistical software EZR v. 1.54». Results and discussion. A correlation of the biomarker lipocalin with a complicated course was found. The value of the rank correlation coefficient r = 0.409, p = 0.0000999. The optimal threshold value of the IFABP marker for predicting the risk of developing a complicated course of COVID-19 in children is 78.536 ng/ml. The sensitivity of the test is 57.4 %, specificity is 80.6 %. AUC = 0.746 (95 % CI 0.64—0.851). Conclusions. The predictive value of lipocalin for the risk of developing a complicated course of COVID-19 in children has been established. The optimal threshold value of the marker for predicting the risk of developing severe COVID-19 in children is 78.536 ng/ml.