Comparison of Cerebrospinal Fluid Biomarkers for Differential Diagnosis of Acute Bacterial and Viral Meningitis with Atypical Cerebrospinal Fluid Characteristics.

Objective: Several cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) biomarkers are used to distinguish between acute bacterial meningitis (BM) and viral meningitis (VM). We compared the ability of lactate and glucose (GL) in CSF and the CSF/blood GL ratio to distinguish between acute BM and VM with typical and atypical CSF characteristics.

Methods: Three hundred and twenty-four CSF reports were included, which were distributed as the acute BM, VM, and normal control groups (n = 63, 139, and 122, respectively).