LEUKERGY TEST, A SIMPLE NEW TEST IN THE DIAGNOSIS OF POSTOPERATIVE ORTHOPEDIC WOUND INFECTION...10

Post operative wound infection is a common problem encountered in many hospitals allover the world. It necessitates the increase in resources loss, the more stay in hospital, the more of economy to spend on to combat. Thus its prevention & monitoring to detect earlier can help to reduce all mentioned resources & efforts. A simple test to predict such an infection besides clinical features & other laboratory tests is recommended. We tried to perform leukergy test on 83 patients, out of 103, who underwent different orthopedic surgical procedures in Basrah General Hospital, along with looking for the existence of postoperative wound infection using clinical manifestations, aided by laboratory tests including complete blood count, estimation of ESR & qualitative determination of CRP. We found that the rate of postoperative wound infection (13.5%) was slightly higher in our study than reported ones. Leukergy test showed a sensitivity of 85.71 % & specificity of 75.36 %, thus positive leukergy test was significantly related to the existence of post operative wound infection & negative result was significantly related to the absence of such an infection.