Urinary vanin-1 for predicting acute pyelonephritis in young children with urinary tract infection: a pilot study

Abstract

Background

Vanin-1, an epithelial glycosylphosphatidylolinositol (GPI)-anchored pantetheinase, is a valuable marker of renal injury.

Purpose

The aim of this study was to assess the predictive value of vanin-1 in acute pyelonephritis (APN) in comparison to the conventional serum inflammatory markers in children aged 1–24 months with the first episode of urinary tract infection (UTI).

Material and methods

Urinary vanin-1, vanin-1/Cr ratio, WBC, CRP, PCT were analysed in 58 children with febrile UTI and in 18 children with non-febrile UTI. Febrile UTI group was divided into APN subgroup (n = 29) and non-APN subgroup (n = 29), based on the results of Tc-99m-ethylenedicysteine scan.

Results

The mean vanin-1 level was higher in the APN group compared to the non-febrile UTI group (p = 0.02) and did not differ between APN and non-APN subgroup. In univariate analysis, vanin-1 (p = 0.042), CRP (p < 0.001), PCT (p < 0.001), and WBC (p = 0.022), were associated with APN, but only vanin-1 (p = 0.048) and CRP (p = 0.002) were independent markers of APN. In ROC analysis, vanin-1, with its best cut-off value of 16.53 ng/mL, had worse diagnostic profile (AUC 0.629, sensitivity 58,6%, specificity 63.8%) than CRP, PCT and WBC (AUC: 0.937; 0.880; 0.667, respectively).

Conclusions

Vanin-1 is not useful for predicting APN, since its diagnostic value is inferior to other conventional serum inflammatory markers.

Keywords:

• Vanin-1
• oxidative stress
• biomarkers
• urinary tract infection
• acute pyelonephritis
• children

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest regarding the study.

Data availability statement

The data support the findings of the study are available from the corresponding author, AS, upon request.