Results from the national sepsis practice survey: predictions about mortality and morbidity and recommendations for limitation of care orders.

ABSTRACT:

Introduction

Critically ill patients and families rely upon physicians to provide estimates of prognosis and recommendations for care. Little is known about patient and clinician factors which influence these predictions. The association between these predictions and recommendations for continued aggressive care is also understudied.

Methods

We administered a mail-based survey with simulated clinical vignettes to a random sample of the Critical Care Assembly of the American Thoracic Society. Vignettes represented a patient with septic shock with multi-organ failure with identical APACHE II scores and sepsis-associated organ failures. Vignettes varied by age (50 or 70 years old), body mass index (BMI) (normal or obese) and co-morbidities (none or recently diagnosed stage IIA

SUBMITTER: O'Brien JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2717468 | biostudies-literature | 2009

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature