Accuracy Comparison Between Age-Adapted SOFA and SIRS in Predicting in-Hospital Mortality of Infected Children at China's PICU.

OBJECTIVES: Sepsis-3 consensus suggests "the need to develop similar updated definitions for pediatric populations." Sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) and systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) criteria are two systems widely used to define the status of infection. However, it is still unclear whether SOFA is more accurate than SIRS in predicting children mortality in low- and middle-income countries. Thus, we validated the accuracy of age-adapted SOFA and SIRS in predicating the poor prognosis of infected children in China's pediatric intensive care unit (PICU).

METHODS: We performed a retrospective and observational cohort study of children admitted for infection to PICU in the hospital between January 1, 2009 and December 31, 2017. The indexes within 24 h after intensive care unit (ICU) admission were analyzed according to age-adapted SOFA and SIRS, and all data were sourced from the hospital's electronic health record database. The prognosis was illustrated with primary outcome and secondary outcome. Primary outcome referred to in-hospital mortality, and secondary outcome to in-hospital mortality or ICU length of stay ≥ 7 days. The predictive power of age-adapted SOFA and SIRS was compared using crude and adjusted area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC).

RESULTS: Of 1,831 PICU-admitted children due to infection, 164 (9.0%) experienced primary outcome, and 948 (51.8%) secondary outcome. Of 164 deaths, 65.9% were males (median age of 7.53 months, range of 2.67-41.00 months). Children who scored ≥ 2 in age-adapted SOFA or met two SIRS criteria accounted for 92.5% and 73.3%, respectively. In addition, age-adapted SOFA score of ≥2 predicted adverse outcome more accurately than pediatric SIRS (adjusted AUROC, 0.753; 0.713-0.796 vs. 0.674; 0.631-0.702; P < 0.001).

CONCLUSION: Compared with SIRS criteria, age-adapted SOFA score of ≥ 2 enjoys a more accuracy in predicting in-hospital mortality of PICU-admitted children, and a higher sensitivity in identifying children with severe infection.