Pediatric Risk of Mortality III Score – Predictor of Mortality and Hospital Stay in Pediatric Intensive Care Unit

BACKGROUND: Pediatric Risk of Mortality (PRISM) III score is one of the widely used scoring systems to quantify critical illness in the pediatric age group. This study was carried out to find the association of PRISM III score with the outcome (discharge/mortality) and also hospital stay in survivors and nonsurvivors. SETTING: The study was conducted in a tertiary care hospital from January 2014 to June 2015. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 524 patients were admitted, and after excluding the patients who met the exclusion criteria, 486 patients were analyzed. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS: Logistic regression was used to find the association of variables under the PRISM III score with mortality. Linear regression was used to find the association of PRISM III score with length of stay. RESULTS: Mortality was 31%; male: female ratio was 1.5:1. Maximum patients presented with respiratory system involvement (26.3%), and maximum mortality (20.3%) was observed in the patients with respiratory involvement. Discrimination by the model between mortality and survival was excellent (receiver operating characteristic curve [0.903]). Maximum risk of mortality was noticed in mechanically ventilated patients (odds ratio [OR]: 10.87) followed by lower systolic blood pressure (OR: 2.72), deranged prothrombin time, partial thromboplastin time (OR: 1.50), deranged mental status (OR: 1.41), and tachycardia (OR: 1.37). Length of stay (LOS) in patients increased till PRISM III score of 25. Average LOS in survivors was 4.327 days which was not accounted by difference in PRISM III score between different patients. With each unit increase in PRISM III score, LOS increased by 5 h. CONCLUSIONS: PRISM III score has excellent capacity to discriminate between survival and mortality. PRISM III score can be used to predict LOS among survivors.