title: Survival of hospitalized elderly patients with delirium: a prospective study.
abstract: The authors tested the relationship between clinically diagnosed delirium during hospitalization and increased mortality after accounting for pre-hospital measures of global cognition, physical functioning, and medical comorbidity. Patients (N=102), 53 of which were hospitalized during the course of a year, received the Mini-Mental State Exam, Physical Self-Maintenance Scale, Cumulative Illness Rating Scale, and 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale. Mortality rates were determined at discharge and after 3 years. Patients who developed delirium did not differ on pre-hospitalization levels of depression, global cognitive performance, physical functioning, or medical comorbidity. Three-year mortality in the hospitalized subjects was 75% for delirium patients vs. 51% for control patients (risk ratio=2.24). Delirium occurring during hospitalization places elderly subjects at long-term risk of mortality. This effect is not accounted for by earlier measures of cognitive, functional, or health status.
authors.affiliation: Section on Geriatric Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania, Philadephia, USA.
authors.forename: K J
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Curyto
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Johnson
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: TenHave
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mossey
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Knott
authors.forename: I R
authors.initials: IR
authors.lastname: Katz
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003693:Delirium / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000401:mortality*; D005260:Female; D006760:Hospitalization / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D015143:Philadelphia / Q000453:epidemiology; D011379:Prognosis; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012306:Risk; D015996:Survival Rate