Elderly patients are at high risk of night-time admission to the intensive care unit following a rapid response team call

Night-time detection and response in relation to deteriorating inpatients: A scoping review

BACKGROUND

Although detection and response to clinical deterioration have been studied, the range and nature of studies focused on night-time clinical setting remain unclear.

AIM

This study aimed to identify and map existing research and findings concerning night-time detection and response to deteriorating inpatients in usual care or research settings.

STUDY DESIGN

A scoping review method was used. PubMed, CINAHL, Web of Science, and Ichushi-Web databases were systematically searched. We included studies focusing on night-time detection and response to clinical deterioration.

RESULTS

Twenty-eight studies were included. These studies were organized into five categories: night-time medical emergency team or rapid response team (MET/RRT) response, night-time observation using the early warning score (EWS), available resources for physicians' practice, continuous monitoring of specific parameters, and screening for night-time clinical deterioration. The first three categories were related to interventional measures in usual care settings, and relevant findings mainly demonstrated the actual situation and challenges of night-time practice. The final two categories were related to the interventions in the research settings and included innovative interventions to identify at-risk or deteriorating patients.

CONCLUSIONS

Systematic interventional measures, such as MET/RRT and EWS, could have been sub-optimally performed at night. Innovations in monitoring technologies or implementation of predictive models could be helpful in improving the detection of night-time deterioration.

RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE

This review provides a compilation of current evidence regarding night-time practice concerning patient deterioration. However, a lack of understanding exists on specific and effective practices regarding timely action for deteriorating patients at night.

Unplanned ICU Admission From Hospital Wards After Rapid Response Team Review in Australia and New Zealand

OBJECTIVES

To evaluate what proportion of unplanned ICU admissions from hospital wards occurred after rapid response team review and compare baseline characteristics and outcomes of patients admitted after rapid response team review with non-rapid response team-related admissions.

DESIGN

Multicenter binational retrospective cohort study.

SETTING

One-hundred seventy-eight ICUs across Australia and New Zealand.

PATIENTS

All adults (≥ 17 yr) in the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society Adult Patient Database between 2012 and 2017.

INTERVENTIONS

None.

MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS

Among 97,181 unplanned ICU admissions from the ward, prior rapid response team review occurred in 55,084 cases (56.7%). Rapid response team patients were slightly older (65.4 [16.9] vs 63.3 [18]), had a higher Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation III score (64.6 [27.1] vs 54.7 [25.3]) and more frequently had limitations of medical treatment (13.1% vs 8.5%) compared with patients with no rapid response team review. The strongest independent associations with ICU admission following rapid response team review included age, ICU admission diagnosis (especially sepsis-, neurologic-, respiratory-, and cardiovascular-related), tertiary ICU status, and presence of limitations of medical treatment (p < 0.0001 all comparisons). Rapid response team-related ICU admissions had a longer median ICU (2.4 d [1.2-4.6 d] vs 2.1 d [1.0-4.2 d]) and hospital (12.8 d [7.0-23.6 d] vs 10.8 d [5.9-20.3 d]) length of stay, and were more likely to die in the ICU (12.3% vs 7.5%) and in-hospital (20.8% vs 13.5%) (p < 0.0001). After adjusting for illness severity and institution, patients admitted following rapid response team review stayed longer in hospital but were not at increased risk of dying in-hospital (adjusted odds ratio, 1.03; 0.98-1.07).

CONCLUSIONS

In Australia and New Zealand, hospital ward patients admitted to ICU following rapid response team review represent the majority of ward-based ICU admissions, are more chronically and acutely ill, and more frequently have sepsis than those admitted from the ward without rapid response team review. Their unadjusted outcomes are worse, but after adjustment their mortality is similar.

Emergency department risk factors for serious clinical deterioration in a paediatric hospital in Peru

AIM

Identification of critically ill children upon presentation to the emergency department (ED) is challenging, especially when resources are limited. The objective of this study was to identify ED risk factors associated with serious clinical deterioration (SCD) during hospitalisation in a resource-limited setting.

METHODS

A retrospective case-control study of children less than 18 years of age presenting to the ED in a large, freestanding children's hospital in Peru was performed. Cases had SCD during the first 7 days of hospitalisation whereas controls did not. Information collected during initial ED evaluation was used to identify risk factors for SCD.

RESULTS

A total of 120 cases and 974 controls were included. In univariate analysis, young age, residence outside Lima, evaluation at another facility prior to ED presentation, congenital malformations, abnormal neurologic baseline, co-morbidities and a prior paediatric intensive care unit admission were associated with SCD. In multivariate analysis, age < 12 months, residence outside Lima and evaluation at another facility prior to ED presentation remained associated with SCD. In addition, comatose neurological status, hypoxaemia, tachycardia, tachypnoea and temperature were also associated with SCD.

CONCLUSIONS

Many risk factors for SCD during hospitalisation can be identified upon presentation to the ED. Using these factors to adjust monitoring during and after the ED stay has the potential to decrease SCD events. Further studies are needed to determine whether this holds true in other resource-limited settings.

Characteristics and outcome of rapid response team patients ≥75 years old: a prospective observational cohort study

BACKGROUND

Rapid response teams (RRTs) attend severely ill general ward patients whose average 30-day mortality is near 30%. A major part of RRT patients are over 75 years old, but there are no studies on the characteristics and outcome of this geriatric RRT population. We compared the characteristics and outcome of geriatric RRT sub-population with the RRT patients <75 years old. We further investigated, whether the accumulation of risk factors (RFs) for mortality among the general RRT population predicts a tenuous outcome among the geriatric sub-population.

METHODS

Prospective three-year observational cohort study of adult RRT patients in Tampere University Hospital, Finland. After identifying independent RFs for 30-day mortality among RRT patients with multivariate logistic regression, we further studied the impact of the accumulation of these RFs among geriatric RRT patients who had no limitations of medical treatment.

RESULTS

A total of 1372 patients were reviewed 1722 times. Geriatric patients (n = 449, 33%), when compared to non-geriatric patients, had higher 30-day (33% vs. 21%, respectively; p < 0.001) and one-year (54% vs. 35%, respectively; p < 0.001) mortality rates. Among the general RRT population, positive RRT criteria as measured by RRT during the review, high comorbidity index, age ≥ 75 years, non-elective hospital admission, medical reason for admission and afferent limb failure were identified as independent RFs for 30-day mortality and classified as feasible to obtain during a routine RRT review. The observed rates of these RFs among the geriatric RRT patients substantially affected their 30-day mortality (e.g. no RFs: 5.3%; one RF: 14%; two RFs: 27%; three RFs: 38%; four RFs: 52%; five RFs: 38%).

CONCLUSIONS

One-third of patients reviewed by RRT were ≥75 years old, and age statistics were comparable to previous RRT studies suggesting that this is the case globally. Outcome of geriatric RRT patients is poorer as compared with RRT patients <75 years. However, the outcome is substantially affected by the accruement (or lack) of RFs generally increasing the mortality of RRT patients. Considering these factors during a geriatric RRT review may aid with the decision to either escalate or de-escalate care.