Mortality in chronically critically ill patients: Expanding the use of the ProVent score

Purpose The purpose of the study is to look at the performance of the Prognosis for Prolonged Ventilation (ProVent) score with a short-term outcome as well as when used earlier during the course of prolonged mechanical ventilation (MV). Materials and methods This retrospective study was performed in a tertiary public hospital from August 2011 to August 2012. All patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) during this period were included in the study. Chronically critically ill ( CCI ) patients were defined as those with 21 days of MV. In a subsequent analysis, we considered CCI patients to be those with 14 days of MV. The data were collected in 2 ways: review of a prospectively elaborated database and review of electronic records. Results During the study period, 1360 patients were admitted to the ICU. Of these, 152 patients (11.2%) were considered CCI. Patients with high ProVent score presented higher ICU mortality. Mortality ranged from 25.0% for patients with a score of 0 to 84.0% for patients with a score of greater than or equal to 4. The analysis of the ProVent score performed earlier during the evolution (14 days of MV) was similar. Conclusions The ProVent score can be used for short-term prognosis (mortality in the ICU) and earlier in the evaluation of CCI patients.