CORRELATION OF PERISCREEN STRIP RESULTS AND WHITE CELL COUNT IN PERITONEAL DIALYSIS PERITONITIS

SUMMARY Introduction: Monitoring of peritoneal dialysis (PD) peritonitis can be difficult for visually impaired patients. PeriScreen strips measure leukocyte esterase activity and this might be a useful objective test that can be performed by patients at home. Methods: A prospective study of 138 episodes of peritonitis was undertaken. Effluent samples were analysed for white cell count (WCC) and PeriScreen score on days 3 and 5. Co‐morbidity data were collated from these patients. Results: Effluent WCC and PeriScreen results were found to correlate with the gold standard assessment of microbiology WCC count. A positive PeriScreen result on day 5 predicted that the episode of peritonitis would relapse after treatment with a sensitivity of 80% but with a poor specificity of 45%. Patients who cleared or relapsed their peritonitis could not be differentiated based on their burden of co‐morbidity, Karnofsky scores, age, dialysis vintage or infective organism. Conclusion: PeriScreen strip analysis correlated with microscopic WCC of PD. However, analysis of PD effluent on day 5 of treatment is not a good test to risk stratify patients for relapsing peritonitis.