Application of Cerebrospinal Fluid Host Protein Biosignatures in the Diagnosis of Tuberculous Meningitis in Children from a High Burden Setting

Table 2

Utility of the previously established 3-marker CSF biosignature in the diagnosis of TBM in a new cohort of children with suspected meningitis. Cut-off values shown for VEGF A and IL-13 are in pg/ml. Values shown for cathelicidin LL-37 are the optical densities.

Biosignature	AUC (95% CI)	Cut-off value	Sensitivity % (95% CI)	Specificity % (95% CI)	PPV	NPV
VEGF A	0.81 (0.67-0.94)	>9.4	82.6 (61.2-95.1)	79.2 (57.9-92.9)	79.2 (63.0-89.5)	82.6 (65.6-92.2)
IL-13	0.58 (0.42-0.75)	>524.9	52.2 (30.6-73.2)	66.7 (44.7-84.4)	60.0 (43.0-74.9)	59.3 (46.6-70.8)
Cathelicidin LL37	0.55 (0.38-0.71)	>0.045	69.6 (47.1-86.8)	50.0 (29.1-70.9)	57.1 (45.1-68.4)	63.2 (45.1-78.2)
VEGF+IL-13+cathelicidin LL37	0.61 (95% CI, 0.50-0.72)	N/A	30.4 (5.6-50.9)	91.7 (74.2-97.7)	77.8 (44.8-93.8)	57.9 (50.6-64.9)
Any two out of the three biomarkers	0.73 (0.60-0.85)	N/A	78.3 (58.1-90.3)	66.7 (46.7-82.0)	69.2 (55.1-80.5)	76.2 (58.4-84.4)
Any one out of the three biomarkers	0.67 (0.56-0.77)	N/A	95.7 (79.0-99.2)	37.5 (21.2-57.3)	59.5 (51.5-66.9)	90.0 (55.3-98.5)