Study of Serum Albumin Level in Community Acquired Pneumonia

INTRODUCTION AND AIM: Patients who are admitted to hospital with pneumonia are at risk of subsequent recurrent pneumonia and death even after discharge. This risk may be even higher in patients, who have a low serum albumin level on admission. This study was conducted to determine serum albumin level in patients with CAP as compared to healthy individuals and to observe the correlation of serum albumin level with severity of CAP. METHODOLOGY: This study was carried in department of TB-chest at Gandhi medical college, Bhopal. The study includes 30 cases of CAP and 30 age and sex matched healthy controls. The cases were divided according to CRB-65BTS criteria, in less severe pneumonia group A (score0-1, n=16), moderate pneumonia group B (score2-3, n=8), very severe pneumonia group C (score4, n=6). The serum was assayed quantitatively for albumin in biochemistry department and compared statistically. RESULTS: Patients with CAP have low levels of serum albumin (mean value 2.91±0.09 gm/dl) and this value further decreases significantly with increasing severity of pneumonia (p<0.001). In control group, mean value of serum albumin was 3.21±0.10g/dl with no significant effect of age and sex. In pneumonia cases, serum albumin shows decreasing trend along with increasing severity of pneumonia with statistically significant (p<0.001) difference in mean serum albumin level in all three CAP groups with different level of severity. CONCLUSION: Serum albumin may be a good easily available and cheap indirect marker of not only nutritional status of the patient but also, it can be correlated with severity of community acquired pneumonia and thus prognosis.