Objective To identify the risk factors that influence outcome for patients who are diagnosed with septic shock in the emergency department at presentation or within 24 hours after admission to intensive care unit. Methods A retrospective study of 57 adult patients with septic shock was conducted between March 1, 2006 and August 31, 2009. Results The patients were 23 males and 34 females with a median age of 67 years (20 to 92 years). Thirty-three (58%) of 57 patients died in hospital and 24 (42%) survived. Multivariate analysis identified low blood pH (OR <0.001; 95% CI <0.001-0.53) and low bicarbonate level (OR 0.81; 95% CI 0.70-0.95) at emergency department or intensive care unit admission as useful predictors of 3-day in-hospital mortality. Low blood pH (OR <0.001; 95% CI <0.001-0.05), low bicarbonate level (OR 0.75; 95% CIs 0.61-0.91), long duration of symptoms (OR 1.49; 95% CI 1.04-2.13), high MEDS score (OR 1.56; 95% CIs 1.06-2.30), and high SOFA score (OR 1.57; 95% CI 1.12-2.20) were risk factors for 14-day in-hospital mortality. Renal failure (OR 7.58; 95% CI 1.28-44.77), lower pulmonary tract infection (OR 3.58; 95% CI 1.10-11.58), high MEDS score (OR 1.42; 95% CI 1.05-1.93) and high APACHE II score (OR 1.34; 95% CI 1.13-1.60) were risk factors for 28-day in-hospital mortality. Conclusions Several factors signaling poor short-term outcome for this patient group are low blood pH, low serum bicarbonate level, longer duration of symptoms, lower respiratory tract infection and renal failure. MEDS and SOFA scores might be helpful in the ED to stratify patients with septic shock according to mortality risk.
Baseline demographic, clinical and laboratory risk factors for predicting admission to intensive care unit in patients diagnosed with COVID-19 in the emergency department