Multimarker panel in patients admitted to emergency department: a comparison with reference methods.

OBJECTIVES: Point of care testing and multimarker panels are rapidly expanding in emergency departments. We determined the reliability of Short-of-Breath SOB panel in patients admitted for acute dyspnea and/or chest pain. DESIGN AND METHODS: SOB D-dimer, BNP, cTnI, CK-MB and myoglobin assays were compared with references in 97 outpatients. RESULTS: The correlation between SOB and references methods was acceptable, but with limited precision and accuracy. CONCLUSIONS: Diagnostic performances and cut-off values should be further validated before clinicians replace traditional cardio-respiratory biomarkers by the new SOB panel.