Plasma neutrophil gelatinase associated lipocalin diagnosed acute kidney injury in patients with systemic inflammatory disease and sepsis

Aim: Sepsis is the leading cause of ICU admission. Plasma NGAL is a promising biomarker for AKI detection, however it is also increased with inflammation and few studies have been conducted in non-caucasion populations and/or in developing economies. Therefore, we evaluated plasma NGAL’s diagnostic performance in the presence of sepsis and systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) in a Malaysian ICU cohort. Methods: This is a prospective observational study on patients with SIRS. Plasma creatinine (pCr) and NGAL were measured on ICU admission. Patients were classified according to the occurrence of AKI and sepsis. Results: Of 225 patients recruited, 129 (57%) had sepsis of whom 67 (52%) also had AKI. 96 patients (43%) had non-infectious SIRS, of whom 36 (21%) also had AKI. NGAL concentrations were higher in AKI patients within both the sepsis and non-infectious SIRS cohorts (both p