Background: This study sought to predict time to patient hemodynamic stabilization during trauma resuscitations of hypotensive patient encounters using electronic medical records (EMR) data.
Methods: This observational cohort study leveraged EMR data from a nine-hospital academic system composed of Level I, Level II and non-trauma centers. Injured, hemodynamically unstable (initial systolic blood pressure < 90 mmHg) emergency encounters from 2015-2020 were identified. Stabilization was defined as documented subsequent systolic blood pressure > 90 mmHg. We predicted time to stabilization testing random forests, gradient boosting and ensembles using patient, injury, treatment, EPIC Trauma Narrator and hospital features from the first four hours of care.
Results: Of 177,127 encounters, 1347 (0.8%) arrived hemodynamically unstable; 168 (12.5%) presented to Level I trauma centers, 853 (63.3%) to Level II, and 326 (24.2%) to non-trauma centers. Of those, 747 (55.5%) were stabilized with a median of 50 minutes (IQR 21-101 min). Stabilization was documented in 94.6% of unstable patient encounters at Level I, 57.6% at Level II and 29.8% at non-trauma centers (p < 0.001). Time to stabilization was predicted with a C-index of 0.80. The most predictive features were EPIC Trauma Narrator measures; documented patient arrival, provider exam, and disposition decision. In-hospital mortality was highest at Level I, 3.0% vs. 1.2% at Level II, and 0.3% at non-trauma centers (p < 0.001). Importantly, non-trauma centers had the highest re-triage rate to another acute care hospital (12.0%) compared to Level II centers (4.0%, p < 0.001).
Conclusion: Time to stabilization of unstable injured patients can be predicted with EMR data.
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