Indian Journal of Clinical Medicine

Background: Intensive care has become very important in the management of critically ill children who require advanced airway, respiratory, and hemodynamic supports and are usually admitted into the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) with the aim of achieving an outcome better than if the patients were admitted into other parts of the hospital. It becomes important to audit admissions and their outcome, which may help to modify practices if necessary following thorough introspection, leading to better patient outcomes.

Objective: To evaluate the morbidity pattern and outcome of admissions into the PICU of a tertiary care center in India.

Methods: A retrospective study in which records of admissions (from August 2012 to June 2013) were obtained from the PICU records. Information retrieved included age, sex, diagnosis, duration of stay in the unit, and outcome.

Results: Mean age of the studied 341 patients was 40.01 ± 45.79 months; 50.7% were infants and 59.8% were males. The three most common disease categories admitted were cardiovascular disease (41.1%), neurological disorders (12.0%), and respiratory disease (10.0%). The mean duration of stay in PICU was 3.2 ± 4.5 days. The overall mortality rate was 2.1%.

Conclusion: Mortality is low in our PICU. We conclude that a well-equipped intensive care unit with modern and innovative intensive care greatly facilitates the care of critically ill patients giving desirable outcome. An expansion of the pediatric wards is advocated to enhance cost–effective management of patients and avoid unnecessary stretch of the PICU facilities.