Abstract:Objective To explore the efficacy of procalcitonin (PCT) algorithms for antibiotic treatment decisions in adult patients with sepsis, so as to provide a reference for clinical decision. Methods PubMed, EMbase, the Cochrane Library, Web of Science, CBMdisc, CNKI and Wanfang databases were systematically searched for randomized controlled trials (RCT) of PCT algorithms for antibiotic treatment in adult patients with sepsis. Study selection, data extraction and quality assessment were applied independently by two reviewers, and then RevMan 5.2 software was used for conducting meta-analysis. Results A total of 10 RCTs including 1,620 patients were included. The results of meta-analysis demonstrated that compared with the control group, the PCT-guided group significantly reduced the duration of antibiotic treatment and hospital stay [MD1 = -1.41, 95% CI1 : (-2.15, -0.68),P1 = 0.000; MD2 = -2.98, 95% CI2 : (-4.92, -1.05), P2 = 0.002]; while there were no statistical differences in hospital mortality, 28-day mortality or duration of hospital stay in ICU between the two groups [RR1= 0.98, 95% CI1 : (0.72, 1.33), P1 = 0.090; RR2 = 1.03, 95% CI2 : (0.85, 1.24),P2 = 0.770; MD3 = -0.01, 95% CI3 : (-0.27, 0.25), P3 = 0.930]. Conclusions PCT-guided therapy may reduce the duration of antibiotic treatment and hospital stay without affecting hospital mortality or 28-day mortality. However, high-quality and large-scale randomized controlled trials are still needed to confirm our study.