Pierce RW, et al. - In this prospective observational study, children of age < 5 years were estimated to assess the diagnostic significance of angiopoietin-1 or -2 (angpt-1, -2) levels for severe sepsis/shock in toddlers and also to examine their impact over permeability of cultured human dermal microvascular endothelial cells (HDMEC). They noted higher levels of Angpt-1 in younger children as compared to levels obtained in an earlier study of older children across disease severity. They observed candidates with severe sepsis/septic shock with elevated angpt-2 than children without non-systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) and SIRS/sepsis. They recommended angpt-2 levels and the angpt-2/1 ratio, suitable diagnostic biomarkers of severe sepsis/septic shock in kids less than 5 years old. Additionally, they did not find any influence of angpt-1 or -2 on basal HDMEC permeability alone or accentuation in TNF induced capillary leak.