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A new interesting article has been published in Clin Chem Lab Med. 2019 Jul 24. pii: /j/cclm.ahead-of-print/cclm-2019-0391/cclm-2019-0391.xml. doi: 10.1515/cclm-2019-0391. and titled:

Diagnostic and prognostic value of the D-dimer test in emergency department patients: secondary analysis of an observational study.

Authors of this article are:

Vögeli A, Ghasemi M, Gregoriano C, Hammerer A, Haubitz S, Koch D, Kutz A, Mueller B, Schuetz P.

A summary of the article is shown below:

Background D-dimer measurement improves the rule-out of thromboembolic disease. However, little is known about the risk of false positive results for the diagnosis of thromboembolic disease and its prognostic value. Herein, we investigated factors influencing the accuracy of D-dimer and its prognostic value in a large cohort of emergency department (ED) patients. Methods This is a secondary analysis of a prospective observational single center, cohort study. Consecutive patients, for whom a D-dimer test was requested by the treating physician, were included. Associations of clinical parameters on admission with false positive D-dimer results for the diagnosis of thromboembolic disease were investigated with logistic regression analysis. Results A total of 3301 patients were included, of which 203 (6.1%) had confirmed thromboembolic disease. The negative and positive predictive values of the D-dimer test at the 0.5 mg/L cut-off were 99.9% and 11.4%, respectively. Several factors were associated with positive D-dimer results potentially falsely indicating thromboembolic disease in multivariate analysis including advanced age (odds ratio [OR] 1.04, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.04-1.05, p < 0.001), congestive heart failure (CHF) (OR 2.79, 95% CI 1.77-4.4, p < 0.01), renal failure (OR 2.00, 95% CI 1.23-3.24, p = 0.005), history of malignancy (OR 2.6, 95% CI 1.57-4.31, p < 0.001), C-reactive protein (CRP) (OR 1.02, 95% CI 1.01-1.02, p < 0.001) and glomerular filtration rate (GFR) (OR 0.99, 95% CI 0.99-1.00, p = 0.003). Regarding its prognostic value, D-dimer was associated with a 30-day mortality (adjusted OR 1.05, 95% CI 1.02-1.09, p = 0.003) with an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.79. Conclusions While D-dimer allows an accurate rule-out of thromboembolic disease, its positive predictive value in routine ED patients is limited and largely influenced by age, comorbidities and acute disease factors. The strong prognostic value of D-dimer in this population warrants further investigation.
Check out the article’s website on Pubmed for more information:

This article is a good source of information and a good way to become familiar with topics such as: D-dimer;false positive;prognosis;pulmonary embolism.

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