title: Acute physiology and chronic health evaluation (APACHE II) scoring in the Medical Intensive Care Unit, National University Hospital, Singapore.
abstract: The intensive care unit provides multisystem support and therapy to critically ill patients, and represents an expensive part of hospital medicine. This survey validates the use of APACHE II as a severity scoring system that allows reliable prediction of outcome of intensive care patients in Singapore. The mortality rate of 37.4% in our medical intensive care unit compares favourably with the other established intensive care units in the United States of America. Our results also indicate that the aged fared as well as their younger counterparts. Patients with sepsis fared poorer than expected from their APACHE II scores, and stroke patients needing intensive care admission had an extremely poor prognosis (mortality rate of 85.7%). High APACHE II scores are associated with invasive haemodynamic monitoring.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, National University Hospital, Singapore.
authors.forename: K H
authors.initials: KH
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: K P
authors.initials: KP
authors.lastname: Hui
authors.forename: T K
authors.initials: TK
authors.lastname: Lim
authors.forename: W C
authors.initials: WC
authors.lastname: Tan
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005260:Female; D017052:Hospital Mortality; D006785:Hospitals, University; D006801:Humans; D007362:Intensive Care Units / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D007902:Length of Stay; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D012846:Singapore