Diagnosis of infection in critical care

Gene expression profiling of mononuclear cells from patients with sepsis secondary to community-acquired pneumonia

Mechanisms governing the inflammatory response during sepsis involve crosstalk between diverse signaling pathways, but current knowledge provides an incomplete picture of the syndrome. Microarray-based expression profiling is a powerful approach for the investigation of complex clinical conditions such as sepsis. In this study, we investigated whole-genome expression profiles in mononuclear cells from septic patients admitted in intensive care units with community-acquired pneumonia. Blood samples were collected at the time of sepsis diagnosis and seven days later since we aimed to evaluate the role of biological processes or genes possibly involved in patient recovery. Here we provide a detailed description of the study design, including clinical information, experimental methods and procedures regarding data analysis. Metadata corresponding to microarray results deposited in the database Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) under the accession number GSE48080 are also described in this report. Our dataset allows the identification of genes possibly associated with host defense to infection as well as gene expression patterns associated with patient outcome.