title: Is hypertriglyceridemia a prognostic factor in sepsis?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Sepsis and septic shock are important causes of mortality in intensive care unit patients, hence early diagnosis and therapy are important in management of their treatment. The available information on sepsis patients is not enough to recommend or to discard the routine evaluation of triglyceride (TG) levels at the onset of sepsis. The aim of this study was to investigate the association of hypertriglyceridemia and clinical outcome (or mortality) in patients with severe sepsis.
  
  
  METHODS
  Between January 1 and December 31, 2011, a total of 84 patients with sepsis from the intensive internal care unit at the Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey, were investigated retrospectively. Sepsis was defined according to the American College of Chest Physicians/Society of Critical Care Medicine/European Society of Intensive Care Medicine consensus conference definitions. For each patient, survival was recorded at the end of the last day of hospitalization as dead or alive. The TG values were taken retrospectively from the records, which were performed routinely for each patient with sepsis at the time of diagnosis. TG >150 mg/dL was considered as hypertriglyceridemia.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The percentages of male and female patients were 44% and 56%, respectively. The mean age of patients was 71.49±11.071 years. The percentage of patients with TG values more than 150 mg/dL was 81% (25/31) in the non-survivor group and 19% (6/31) in the survivor group. There was a significant difference regarding TG values between groups (P=0.039).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  It was observed in this study that patients in the intensive care unit with sepsis had high TG levels. We also observed that the TG level >150 mg/dL at 0 hour (onset of sepsis) was a significant predictive marker of sepsis mortality rate. The contribution of hypertriglyceridemia to mortality might be modest compared to increase in severity of illness, but, nevertheless, these simple measurements represent a potential therapeutic target in sepsis.
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Ali
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Cetinkaya
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Abdulsamet
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Erden
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Deniz
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Avci
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Hatice
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Karagoz
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Samet
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Karahan
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Mustafa
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Basak
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Kadir
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Bulut
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, Kayseri Training and Research Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Vedat
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Gencer
authors.affiliation: Medical Oncology Department, Acıbadem Kayseri Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey.
authors.forename: Hasan
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Mutlu
keywords: mortality; prognosis; sepsis; triglyceride