Cuidados respiratorios intermedios: un año de experiencia

Background

The aim of this study was to describe the characteristics and results of patients admitted to an intermediate respiratory care unit (IRCU).

Patients and Methods

We performed a 12-month prospective observational study of all the patients admitted to our IRCU during the study period. We analyzed sociodemographic and clinical variables, the APACHE-II score, blood gas parameters, duration of stay in hospital, mortality, and readmission to hospital.

Results

We evaluated 190 patients (64.2% men), with a mean age of 69.4 years. A score of greater than 2 on the Charlson index was recorded in 43.2% of patients. The mean APACHE-II score was 16.3 in the emergency department and 14.3 on entering the IRCU. Fifty percent of the patients were admitted to receive ventilation and, of these, only 6 (5.7%) were admitted for disconnection of the ventilator. The mean duration of stay in the IRCU was 3.7 days. The readmission rate was 12.7% Mortality was 12.6% during hospitalization and 11.6% 90 days after discharge.

Conclusions

The patients admitted to our IRCU were elderly, with considerable comorbidity and high mortality, both during hospitalization and 90 days after discharge from hospital. The results revealed no statistically significant differences (mean length of stay, readmission, mortality) according to the type of care administered to the patients (ventilation compared to monitoring).