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The APACHE II (Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation) system has been widely used as an objective means of predicting outcome in critically ill patients. We

To evaluate the effects of reorganizing physician resources in a medical intensive care unit (MICU), we studied the impact of these changes in patients with septic shock. Patients were compared during two consecutive 12-month periods: (1) an interval in which faculty without critical care medicine (CCM) training supervised the MICU (before CCM, n = 100) and (2) following staffing with physicians formally trained in CCM (after CCM, n = 112). Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation scores were utilized to compare severity of illness and were similar for each group (29 +/- 11 before CCM vs 28 +/- 10 after CCM). However, mortality was significantly lower during the post-CCM interval (74% vs 57%, respectively). There was no significant difference in the frequency of use of mechanical ventilation (83% vs 87%), although pulmonary artery catheters (48% vs 64%) and arterial catheters (24% vs 73%) were employed more frequently after CCM. The number of subspecialty consultations and MICU and hospital length of stay were similar for both intervals. We conclude that the implementation of dedicated staffing by CCM physicians in a university hospital MICU was associated with a favorable impact on patients with septic shock.

The APACHE II (Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation) system has been widely used as an objective means of predicting outcome in critically ill patients. We prospectively evaluated patients consecutively admitted to the medical intensive care unit to compare the predictive accuracy of APACHE II with clinical assessment by critical care personnel. At the time of admission to the intensive care unit, the house staff and nurse responsible for each patient were asked to estimate the patient's hospital mortality risk. The patient's APACHE II score was calculated and a prediction of the patient's hospital mortality risk was then computed on the basis of this score. A total of 366 patients were studied. Mortality predictions were obtained from 57 physicians and 33 critical care nurses. We were unable to demonstrate a significant difference in the accuracy of APACHE II predictions compared with either physicians' or nurses' predictions. Clinical assessment and APACHE II were both highly predictive of outcome.