A New Test In The Follow -up Of The Tre-atment Of Pneumonia

The reliability in the clinical follow - up of prog-ress and recovery from pneumonia of a practical slide test (ST) that is approximately parallel to the plasma fibrinogen level (PFL) has been investigated in a group of 18 patients with bacterial pneumonia and 18 healthy subjects considered as a control group. Test results were compared with white blood cell (WBC) count, WBC differential count, eryt-hrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) and PFL. It was concluded that since at the end of the treatment (15. day) all five of these hematologic tests showed mar-ked declines compared to pre-treatment levels, they could be accepted as indicators of the cure of pne-umonia. However, no significant differences were observed between pre-treatment levels of WBC count and ESR and the corresponding levels me-asured at the end of the 5. and 10. days of the tre-atment period. In contrast. ST. WBC differential count and PFL values dropped consistently thro-ughout the treatment and returned either to normal or nearly normal levels upon recovery. We conclude that among these tests ST and WBC differential count were better suited to the treatment of bacterial pneumonia because of their low cost and ease in application.