Kahn et al reported the POSITIVE score to evaluate a patient with Staphylococcus aureus bacteremia. This can help to identify a patient with endocarditis. The authors are from Skane University Hospital and Lund University in Sweden.
Patient selection: Staphylococcus aureus bacteremia.
Parameters:
(1) time to blood culture positivity in hours
(2) intravenous drug use
(3) vascular phenomena
(4) predisposing heaert disease
Parameter
Finding
Points
time to culture positivity
< 9 hours
5
9 to 10.99 hours
3
11 to 12.99 hours
2
>= 13 hours
0
intravenous drug use
no
yes
vascular phenomena
6
predisposing heart disease
total score =
= SUM(points for all of the parameters)
Interpretation:
• minimum score: 0
• maximum score: 19
• A score > 4 indicates infective endocarditis.
Performance:
• The area under the ROC curve is 0.93.
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Specialty: Infectious Diseases
