Interaction of acute heart failure and acute kidney injury on in-hospital mortality of critically ill patients with sepsis: A retrospective observational study

PLoS One. 2023 Mar 8;18(3):e0282842. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0282842. eCollection 2023.

Abstract

Background: The present study aimed to evaluate the synergistic impact of acute heart failure (AHF) and acute kidney injury (AKI) on in-hospital mortality in critically ill patients with sepsis.

Methods: We undertook a retrospective, observational analysis using data acquired from the Medical Information Mart for Intensive Care-IV (MIMIC-IV) database and eICU Collaborative Research Database (eICU-CRD). The effects of AKI and AHF on in-hospital mortality were examined using a Cox proportional hazards model. Additive interactions were analyzed using the relative extra risk attributable to interaction.

Results: A total of 33,184 patients were eventually included, comprising 20,626 patients in the training cohort collected from the MIMIC-IV database and 12,558 patients in the validation cohort extracted from the eICU-CRD database. After multivariate Cox analysis, the independent variables for in-hospital mortality included: AHF only (HR:1.20, 95% CI:1.02-1.41, P = 0.005), AKI only (HR:2.10, 95% CI:1.91-2.31, P < 0.001), and both AHF and AKI (HR:3.80, 95%CI:13.40-4.24, P < 0.001). The relative excess risk owing to interaction was 1.49 (95% CI:1.14-1.87), the attributable percentage due to interaction was 0.39 (95%CI:0.31-0.46), and the synergy index was 2.15 (95%CI:1.75-2.63), demonstrated AHF and AKI had a strong synergic impact on in-hospital mortality. And the findings in the validation cohort indicated identical conclusions to the training cohort.

Conclusion: Our data demonstrated a synergistic relationship of AHF and AKI on in-hospital mortality in critically unwell patients with sepsis.

Publication types

  • Observational Study

MeSH terms

  • Acute Kidney Injury*
  • Critical Illness
  • Heart Failure* / complications
  • Hospital Mortality
  • Humans
  • Retrospective Studies
  • Sepsis* / complications

Grants and funding

The authors received no specific funding for this work.