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Published on: April 7, 2023
[Application of the Pediatric Index of Mortality 2 in pediatric patients with complex chronic conditions]
Jaisson G da Fonseca1, Alexandre R Ferreira1
1Hospital das Clínicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil.
Insights
The Pediatric Index of Mortality 2 (PIM2) demonstrated poor performance in predicting mortality for critically ill children with complex chronic conditions (CCCs). Further research is needed to validate PIM2 in diverse pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) populations.
Area of Science:
- Critical Care Medicine
- Pediatric Health Outcomes
- Biostatistics
Context:
- The Pediatric Index of Mortality 2 (PIM2) is a widely used severity scoring system for pediatric intensive care units (PICUs).
- Assessing the performance of PIM2 is crucial, especially in PICUs with a high prevalence of patients with complex chronic conditions (CCCs).
- Understanding PIM2's accuracy in this specific population is vital for resource allocation and clinical decision-making.
Purpose:
- To evaluate the performance of the Pediatric Index of Mortality 2 (PIM2) in a Brazilian PICU.
- To compare PIM2's performance in pediatric patients with and without complex chronic conditions (CCCs).
- To assess both the discriminative and calibration abilities of PIM2 in this cohort.
Summary:
- A prospective cohort study included 677 patients admitted to a PICU between 2009 and 2011; 83.9% had CCCs.
- PIM2 showed adequate discrimination overall (AUC 0.840) and in subgroups, but poor calibration in the general population and CCC patients.
- Mortality was higher in CCC patients (10.3%) versus non-CCC patients (6.4%), but PIM2 did not significantly differ in predicted mortality between groups.
Impact:
- The PIM2 demonstrated suboptimal performance in predicting mortality for pediatric patients with complex chronic conditions.
- The findings suggest that PIM2's utility may be limited in PICUs with a high burden of complex chronic conditions.
- Further validation of PIM2 in diverse PICU populations, particularly those with high CCC prevalence, is warranted.
Objective:
To evaluate the performance of the Pediatric Index of Mortality 2 (PIM2) in a pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) with a high prevalence of patients with complex chronic conditions (CCCs), and compare the performance between patients with and without CCCs.
Methods:
A prospective cohort study was conducted in a PICU in Brazil, with patients admitted between 2009 and 2011. The performance was evaluated through discrimination and calibration. Discrimination was assessed by calculating the area under the ROC curve, and calibration was determined using the Hosmer-Lemeshow goodness-of-fit test.
Results:
A total of 677 patients were included in the study, of which 83.9% had a CCC. Overall mortality was 9.7%, with a trend of higher mortality among patients with CCCs when compared to patients without CCCs (10.3% vs. 6.4%, p = 0.27), but with no difference in the mean probability of death estimated by PIM2 (5.9% vs. 5.6%, p = 0.5). Discrimination was considered adequate in the general population (0.840) and in patients with and without CCCs (0.826 and 0.944). Calibration was considered inadequate in the general population and in patients with CCCs (p < 0.0001 and p < 0.0001), but it was considered adequate in patients without CCCs (p = 0.527).
Conclusions:
PIM2 showed poor performance in patients with CCCs and in the general population. This result may be secondary to differences in the characteristics between the study samples (high prevalence of patients with CCCs); the performance of the PIM2 should not be ruled out.
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