Predicting mortality in patients with suspected sepsis at the Emergency Department: A retrospective cohort study comparing qSOFA, SIRS and National Early Warning Score

  • Anniek Brink*
  • , Jelmer Alsma
  • , Rob Johannes Carel Gerardus Verdonschot
  • , Pleunie Petronella Marie Rood
  • , Robert Zietse
  • , Hester Floor Lingsma
  • , Stephanie Catherine Elisabeth Schuit
  • *Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

141 Citations (Scopus)
14 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Objective: In hospitalized patients, the risk of sepsis-related mortality can be assessed using the quick Sepsis-related Organ Failure Assessment (qSOFA). Currently, different tools that predict deterioration such as the National Early Warning Score (NEWS) have been introduced in clinical practice in Emergency Departments (ED) worldwide. It remains ambiguous which screening tool for mortality at the ED is best. The objective of this study was to evaluate the predictive performance for mortality of two sepsis-based scores (i.e. qSOFA and Systemic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (SIRS)-criteria) compared to the more general NEWS score, in patients with suspected infection directly at presentation to the ED.

Methods: We performed a retrospective cohort study. Patients who presented to the ED between June 2012 and May 2016 with suspected sepsis in a large tertiary care center were included. Suspected sepsis was defined as initiation of intravenous antibiotics and/or collection of any culture in the ED. Outcome was defined as 10-day and 30-day mortality after ED presentation. Predictive performance was expressed as discrimination (AUC) and calibration using Hosmer-Lemeshow goodness-of-fit test. Subsequently, sensitivity, and specificity were calculated.

Results: In total 8,204 patients were included of whom 286 (3.5%) died within ten days and 490 (6.0%) within 30 days after presentation. NEWS had the best performance, followed by qSOFA and SIRS (10-day AUC: 0.837, 0.744, 0.646, 30-day AUC: 0.779, 0.697, 0.631). qSOFA (2) lacked a high sensitivity versus SIRS (2) and NEWS (7) (28.5%, 77.2%, 68.0%), whilst entailing highest specificity versus NEWS and SIRS (93.7%, 66.5%, 37.6%).

Conclusions: NEWS is more accurate in predicting 10- and 30-day mortality than qSOFA and SIRS in patients presenting to the ED with suspected sepsis.

Original languageEnglish
Article numbere0211133
Number of pages14
JournalPLoS ONE
Volume14
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jan-2019
Externally publishedYes

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