Comparative study of the performance of SOFA and qSOFA versus SIRS criteria for predicting mortality among septic patients admitted to the intensive care unit

Background Sepsis is considered one of a life-threatening condition among intensive care unit (ICU) patients. Although, there are evidence-based management guidelines, sepsis still remains a leading cause of death with in-hospital mortality ranging from 22.8% to 48.7%. Previously sepsis was defined as systemic inflammatory response to infection, which could be diagnosed by meeting two or more Systemic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (SIRS) criteria, along with a known or suspected infection. Even though the SIRS criteria were sensitive, but they were not specific enough to differentiate between sepsis and other inflammatory conditions. Objective To compare between the ability of SOFA score, the quick SOFA (qSOFA) and Systemic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (SIRS) to predict ICU mortality. Patients and Methods Randomized prospective comparative study conducted in El Haram Specialized Hospital. The study included 75 patients. We calculated SOFA, SIRS, and qSOFA scores based on physiological and laboratory data that were collected upon admission to the ICU. Standard criteria were applied with a threshold of 2 or more points for each scoring system. The baseline SOFA score was assumed to be zero for patients without a known preexisting organ dysfunction. The baseline total SOFA score was considered to be 4 for patients undergoing chronic dialysis, and 2 or 3 for cirrhotic patients, depending on baseline bilirubin levels. Results ROC curve analysis between survival and each of SIRS, qSOFA and SOFA, it shows that SOFA score presented the best discrimination with an AUC of 0.993 (95% CI 0.981–100). Conclusion In patients with suspected infection admitted to an ICU, an increase in SOFA score had greater prognostic accuracy for in-hospital mortality than SIRS criteria or qSOFA. These findings suggest that SIRS and qSOFA may have limited use for predicting mortality in an ICU setting.