Hyponatremia in Community Acquired Pneumonia in a Tertiary Care Hospital - An Observational Cross-Sectional Study

Background: Community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) is one of the most common infectious diseases and is an important cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide. Studies have shown hyponatremia to be a common electrolyte abnormality in pneumonia. The current study was planned as there is paucity of data on hyponatremia in CAP in our setup. Purpose: To evaluate point prevalence of hyponatremia among patients presenting with community acquired pneumonia and to study correlation between CURB 65 score and levels of hyponatremia. Material and Methods: An observational cross-sectional study conducted in 100 patients of community acquired pneumonia who presented to GMC Jammu to study the correlation between CURB 65 score and levels of hyponatremia in the study cohort. Results: Out of 100 patients that we enrolled, 53% were males and 47% were females; mean age of patients enrolled in our study was 54.32 ± 17.7 years. In our study we found that hyponatremia was present in 50% of patients. Also, there was association between severity of CAP as determined by CURB 65 score and levels of hyponatremia. Among those with hyponatremia, 25% had mild, 17% had moderate and 8% had severe hyponatremia. Conclusion: Current study recorded 50%-point prevalence of hyponatremia among patients presenting with CAP. Further the study established significant association between higher CURB 65 score with hyponatremia. However, study failed to record any association with gender, smoking, alcoholism, rural or urban residence.