ORIGINAL ARTICLE Rising C-Reactive Protein and Procalcitonin Levels Precede Early Complications After Esophagectomy

# 2015 The Author(s). This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Background Elective esophagectomy with gastric tube reconstruction carries a high risk for complications. Early and accurate diagnosis could improve patient management. Increased C-reactive protein (CRP) levels may be associated with any, surgical or infectious, complication and procalcitonin (PCT) specifically with infectious complications. Methods We measured CRP and PCT on post-operative days 0, 1, 2, and 3 in 45 consecutive patients. Complications were recorded up to 10 days post-esophagectomy. Results Twenty-eight patients developed a post-operative complication (5 surgical, 14 infectious, 9 combined surgical/infectious, including anastomotic leakage), presenting on day 3 or later. Elevated days 2 and 3 and a rise in CRP preceded the diagnosis of general or combined surgical/infectious complications (minimum area under the receiver operating characteristics curv