Anest. intenziv. Med. 2009;20(4):185-191

Early identification of critically ill patients with the MEDICAL EMERGENCY SYSTEM in St. Ann University Hospital, BrnoIntensive Care Medicine - Original Paper

Pavlík Martin^*, Dadák Lukáš, Zvoníček Václav, Štětka Pavel, Bartošík Tomáš, Suk Pavel, Šrámek Vladimír

Anesteziologicko-resuscitační klinika, Fakultní nemocnice u svaté Anny v Brně a Lékařská fakulta MU

Objective:
To introduce the Medical Emergency Team in St. Ann University Hospital Brno and to determine its effect on the outcome of patients admitted to the ICU.

Design:
Prospective before-and-after intervention trial in the University Hospital.

Methods:
We studied the patients admitted to the ICU from within the hospital before the introduction of the MET call system (group P, n = 115, September 2005-February 2006), during the "intervention period" (group S, n = 462, June 2006-July 2008) and the patients admitted through the MET call system (group M, n = 76, June 2006- July 2008).

Results:
There were 433 MET calls made, resulting in 76 patients being admitted to the ICU (17.5%) and 36 patients to the HDU (8.3%). Forty six patients died (10.6%). The most frequent criteria for the MET call were low oxygen saturation (24%), dysrhythmias (16%), blood pressure disturbance (16%), GCS drop (15%) and respiratory rate abnormalities (14%). We observed no difference in the short-time mortality between the groups of patients admitted to the ICU before the MET introduction (23%), after the MET introduction (23%) and the patients admitted through the MET system (27%). There was no significant difference in the ICU length of stay between the three groups.

Conclusion:
The introduction of the MET call system had no positive influence on the short-term mortality and the length of stay of the patients admitted to the ICU through this system.

Keywords: Medical Emergency System; Rapid Response System; ICU mortality; morbidity

Received: January 20, 2009; Accepted: May 12, 2009; Published: August 1, 2009  Show citation