We developed and performed the initial retrospective validation of a pediatric severity of illness score.
Illness severity was measured with a neonatal severity of illness score, the SNAP score (Score for Neonatal Acute Physiology).
There was an association between severity of illness score and gallbladder ejection fraction [r = -0.5; P < 0.05].
aGEE adjusted for patient age, gender, APACHE III severity of illness score, ICU length of stay, vital status upon discharge from ICU, readmission to ICU, type of admission (emergency or elective, post-operative or non-operative, ICU or HDU).
As a control group, patients receiving heparin were recruited and were matched with the argatroban group for age, sex, body mass index (BMI) and the severity of illness score SAPS II.
Demographic data (age, sex, actual body weight, body mass index (BMI), baseline renal function, and comorbid conditions), severity of illness score (APACHEII) calculated at the time of ICU admission, Sequential Organ Failure Assessment score (SOFA score) at the commencement of vancomycin, and laboratory parameters were retrospectively collected for each patient in the study.
In this large cohort of patients with S. aureus bacteremia, appropriate empiric therapy and time to appropriate therapy were not associated with decreased mortality except in those patients with the lowest underlying severity of illness score.
A priori we chose the following variables as biologically important: the main predictor variables (either appropriate empiric therapy or time to appropriate therapy), methicillin resistance, age and severity of illness score.
Patients who received appropriate empiric therapy were more likely to be infected with methicillin-susceptible S. aureus (MSSA), to have a polymicrobial infection, to have a higher severity of illness score, to be an injection drug user, to be previously hospitalized in the past year and to have renal disease (p<0.05).
Surgical ICU patients have a lower severity illness score on ICU admission day.
Basal demographic variables and the severity of illness score (APACHE II) were similar for both groups.
