الفهرس 
IntroductionOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
 |  | from | 161 |  |  |
| | | from | 161 | | |
Abstract
C
oronavirus causes a significant infection that mostly affects the respiratory system of humans. In order to stratify high-risk patients of COVID-19, scientists urgently require accurate biomarkers related to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) illness progression.
Variable presentation of the disease could be attributed to the pathological nature of the virus which is associated with up-regulation of immune system and release of huge amount of inflammatory cytokines like IL-6, IL-1, and TNF-α.
Also, Amyloid A (SAA) protein is a non-specific inflammatory marker produced by cytokines il-1ß,il-6 &TNF-a from liver cells, its production in turn promote inflammatory response through activating chemokines and inducing chemotaxis even at very low level.
Many previous studies showed the association between SAA and respiratory system infection especially of viral origin , actually its level was markedly elevated in acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS).
Finding reliable biomarkers for COVID-19 disease progression has been a huge challenge since the beginning of the epidemic. SAA has attracted particular interest among the different biomarkers investigated because of its link to immune-mediated response and development of cytokines storm, so the prediction of disease severity.
These is a case-contrrol study, its aim was to assess serum level of Amyloid A protein and correlate it with disease severity and prognosis of COVID-19 pediatric patients.
The study included 60 children 30 of them were COVID-19 cases and the other 30 were healthy control.
The results was:
As regards SAA level there was statistically significant difference between:
- Patients group at day 1 and control group.
- Patients group at day 1 and at day 10.
As regards SAA level at day 1 there was statistically significant difference between:
- Patients with hypoxia and others with normal oxygen saturation.
- Patients with hypotesion and others with normal blood pressure.
- Patients with cyanosis and others without cyanosis.
- Patients with respiratory distress and others without respiratory distress.
- Patients with bilateral CT-chest lesions and others with unilateral or without lesions..
- Patients with different clinical severity grades.
- Patients with positive total radiological scores and others with zero scores.
Also, there was no significant difference as regards SAA level at day 1 between:-
- Male and female.
- Patients admitted to PICU and non- admitted.
- Patients with abnormal ECHO findings and patients with normal ECHO.
SAA levels at day 1 was :
- Significantly negative correlated with oxygen saturation and blood presuure.
- Significantly positive correlated with number of affected lobes and total radiological score.
- There was no significant correlation with any other inflammatory markers.
As regards SAA level at day 10 there was statistically significant difference between:-
- Survivor patients and non- survivors.