In the patient with postoperative delirium, several plasma cytokines were elevated at baseline relatively to the other patients: calprotectin (5-fold elevation), MIP-1α (2-fold), MIP-1β (3-fold), and IL-6 (14-fold) (see Additional files 1 and 4); these cytokines remained elevated at the later time points. The gene discussed is IL6; the disease is delirium.