title: Survival and quality of life after prolonged intensive care unit stay.
abstract: There are few data on long-term outcomes in mixed groups of intensive care unit (ICU) patients with prolonged stays. We evaluated the relationship between length of stay in the ICU and long-term outcome in all patients admitted to our 31-bed department of medico-surgical intensive care over a one-year period who stayed in the department for more than 10 days (n = 189, 7% of all ICU admissions). Mortality increased with length of stay from 1 to 10 days (1 day 5%, 5 days 15%, 9 days 24%, 10 days 33%) but remained stable at about 35% for longer ICU stays. In the long-stay patients, the most common reasons for ICU admission were intracranial bleeding (23%), polytrauma (14%), respiratory failure (13%) and septic shock (11%). The main reasons for prolonged ICU stay were ventilator dependency (40%), infectious complications (23%) and coma (16%). Long-stay patients had a 65% ICU survival, 55% hospital survival and 37% one-year survival. At one-year follow-up, 73% of surviving patients reported no or minor persistent physical complaints compared to before the acute illness; 27% had a major functional impairment, including 8% who required daily assistance. In conclusion, in ICU patients, mortality increases with length of stay up to 10 days. Patients staying in the ICU for more than 10 days have a relatively good long-term survival. Most survivors have an acceptable quality of life.
authors.affiliation: Department of Intensive Care, Erasme Hospital, Free University of Brussels, Belgium.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Rimachi
authors.forename: J L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Vincent
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Brimioulle
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001530:Belgium; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D007362:Intensive Care Units / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D007407:Interviews as Topic / Q000379:methods; D007902:Length of Stay / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008297:Male; D009026:Mortality; D011788:Quality of Life; D015996:Survival Rate; D013997:Time Factors