Biased and unbiased estimation of the average length of stay in intensive care units in the Covid-19 pandemic.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The average length of stay (LOS) in the intensive care unit (ICU_ALOS) is a helpful parameter summarizing critical bed occupancy. During the outbreak of a novel virus, estimating early a reliable ICU_ALOS estimate of infected patients is critical to accurately parameterize models examining mitigation and preparedness scenarios.

Methods

Two estimation methods of ICU_ALOS were compared: the average LOS of already discharged patients at the date of estimation (DPE), and a standard parametric method used for analyzing time-to-event data which fits a given distribution to observed data and includes the censored stays of patients still treated in the ICU at the date of estimation (CPE). Methods were compared on a series of all COVID-19 consecutive cases (n = 59) admitte

SUBMITTER: Lapidus N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7561433 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature