Table 2.
Clinical characteristic of 16 P. jiroveci PCR-positive patients and 64 age and sex matched PCR-negative controls.
| PCR-positive patients | PCR-negative patients | p-value | |
| N | 16 | 64 | |
| Age, years | 73 (53–78) | 71 (51–78) | |
| Male / female | 6 / 10 | 24 / 40 | |
| Dead within one-month | 7 (44%) | 9 (14%) | p = 0.014 |
| Diagnosis (%) | |||
| Bacterial pneumonia (verified) | 3 (19%) | 13 (20%) | |
| Pneumonia, pathogen not identified | 6 (39%) | 31 (48%) | |
| Acute bronchitis | 5 (31%) | 12 (19%) | |
| Lung malignancy | 0 | 2 (3%) | |
| Cardiac disease | 1 (6%) | 4 (6%) | |
| Other | 1 (6%) | 3 (5%) | |
| Concurrent diseases (%) | |||
| Unknown/None | 1 (6%) | 32 (50%) | |
| COPD | 10 (63%) | 13 (20%) | |
| Malignancy | 1 (6%) | 4 (6%) | |
| Lymphoma and bone marrow-transplant | 1 (6%) | 1 (2%) | |
| NYHA III/IV | 1 (6%) | 13 (20%) | |
| NYHA III/IV and COPD | 1 (6%) | 1 (2%) | |
| Chronic renal failure | 0 | 1 (2%) | |
| Renal transplantation and malignancy | 1 (6%) | 0 | |
| Total number with concurrent diseases | 15 (94%) | 32 (50%) | p = 0.004 |
| Immunosuppressive therapy (%) | |||
| None | 4 (25%) | 56 (87%) | |
| Steroids alone | 10 (63%) | 7 (11%) | p < 0.001 |
| Chemotherapy alone | 0 | 1 (2%) | |
| Chemotherapy and steroids | 1 (6%) | 0 | |
| Azathioprine and steroids | 1 (6%) | 0 | |
| Total number receiving steroids | 12 (75%) | 8 (13%) | |
| Corticosteroid dosea | 37,5 (8,8–58,8) | 7.5 (5–27,5) | p = 0.026 |
| Duration of corticosteroid therapy, weeks (range) | 66 (1–102) | 8 (1–42) | p < 0.001 |
All values are Median (25–75 percentiles). a Corticosteroid dose in daily equivalents of prednisone in milligrams at time of diagnosis. COPD: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. NYHA: New York Heart Association.