did not reach statistical significancep = 0.0781
Although this was higher than that in patients aged <50 years (median 13.4 pg./mL, interquartile range (IQR = 10.6) pg./ml, mean ± standard deviation (14.8 ± 6.1) pg./ml), the difference did not reach statistical significance (( p = 0.0781)) ( Figure 2E ).