Number 1 wellbeing & healthcare platform
Get 20% off your first online booking. Use code: NEW20
Home / Store & packages / C-Reactive Protein (CRP)
Cardiac Risk & Injury Markers
(All prices include VAT)
C Reactive Protein, or CRP, rises in the blood when there is inflammation anywhere in the body. It is a quick, general marker that helps your doctor tell whether an infection or inflammatory condition is present and how active it is. A high level suggests an infection, injury or a flare of an inflammatory disease, and it usually falls again as you recover or respond to treatment. A normal level is reassuring. It is often used together with other tests rather than on its own.
Select your test and preferred time period
Get your results within 24-48 hours
No. Eat, drink and take your usual medication as normal. The only thing worth mentioning to the nurse is any recent injury, surgery, dental work or vaccination in the past week or two, because those can lift CRP on their own and it helps your doctor read the result.
It means there is active inflammation somewhere, not which illness is causing it. A common cold, a chest or urine infection, a recent injury, a flare of an inflammatory joint condition and the days after surgery can all raise it. Your doctor reads the number alongside your symptoms and your other results.
Yes, and it is worth knowing. Pregnancy, smoking, carrying extra weight, a hard workout in the previous day or two and some hormone medicines can all nudge CRP upward. This is one reason a mildly raised result on its own is rarely treated as an answer.
CRP responds within hours and settles within days, so it reflects what is happening now. ESR moves more slowly in both directions and is influenced by age, anaemia and pregnancy. Neither one names a disease. Your doctor may ask for both so the fast and the slow picture can be compared.