Combined detections of interleukin-33 and adenosine deaminase for diagnosis of tuberculous pleural effusion.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the diagnostic accuracy of the combination of interleukin-33 (IL-33) and adenosine deaminase (ADA) for differentiating TPE from pleural effusions with the other etiologies. METHODS Pleural effusion samples were collected from 32 TPE patients and 55 non-TPE patients. Pleural levels of IL-33 and ADA were measured by ELISA. The corresponding biochemical indexes were also simultaneously determined. RESULTS The pleural levels of IL-33 and ADA in the TPE group were significantly higher than those in the non-TPE group. With a cut-off value of 68.3 pg/ml, the sensitivity and specificity for IL-33 were 83.9% and 70.9%, respectively. While for ADA, the sensitivity and specificity were 87.5% and 87.3%, respectively at a cut-off value of 10.25 U/L. Combined use of IL-33 and ADA measurements further increased the sensitivity or specificity. CONCLUSION Our study suggests that the applications of new biomarker IL-33, along with ADA, may serve as efficient diagnosis strategies in the management of pleural TB. Further studies at a large scale should be performed to validate our findings.