Survival of intensive care patients. II: Outcome prediction 1 hour after admission

978 patients from a multidisciplinary intensive care unit (ICU) were followed prospectively to evaluate outcome. At 1 year after admission the cumulative mortality was 26.5%. Age, medical history and different condition variables 1 h after admission were included in logistic regression models in order to identify risk factors for death in the ICU and afterwards. By combining these predictive factors, it was possible to describe clinically interesting patient groups with a low and a high risk, respectively, of dying. 330 patients younger than 65 years, without any history of cancer and without any condition risk factors 1 h after admission, had a cumulative mortality of 6% at 1 year as compared to another group of patients with a 1-year mortality of 63%. In a small group of patients who had all the identified risk factors, the mortality rate at 1 year was 100%. It was also possible to identify a low-risk group of 251 patients (26% of total) who had a risk of death in the ICU of less than 0.5% as compared to 9.6% for the average patient.