Prevalence of organ failure and mortality among patients in the emergency department: a population-based cohort study

Objectives The aim was to describe population-based incidence and emergency department-based prevalence and 1-year all-cause mortality of patients with new organ failure present at arrival. Design This was a population-based cohort study of all citizens in four municipalities (population of 230 000 adults). Setting Emergency department at Odense University Hospital, Denmark. Participants We included all adult patients who arrived from 1 April 2012 to 31 March 2015. Primary and secondary outcome measures Organ failure was defined as a modified Sequential Organ Failure Assessment score≥2 within six possible organ systems: cerebral, circulatory, renal, respiratory, hepatic and coagulation. The primary outcome was prevalence of organ failure, and secondary outcomes were 0–7 days, 8–30 days and 31–365 days all-cause mortality. Results We identified in total 175 278 contacts, of which 70 399 contacts were further evaluated for organ failure. Fifty-two per cent of these were women, median age 62 (IQR 42–77) years. The incidence of new organ failure was 1342/100 000 person-years, corresponding to 5.2% of all emergency department contacts. The 0–7-day, 8–30-day and 31–365-day mortality was 11.0% (95% CI: 10.2% to 11.8%), 5.6% (95% CI: 5.1% to 6.2%) and 13.2% (95% CI: 12.3% to 14.1%), respectively, if the patient had one or more new organ failures at first contact in the observation period, compared with 1.4% (95% CI: 1.3% to 1.6%), 1.2% (95% CI: 1.1% to 1.3%) and 5.2% (95% CI: 5.0% to 5.4%) for patients without. Seven-day mortality ranged from hepatic failure, 6.5% (95% CI: 4.9% to 8.6%), to cerebral failure, 33.8% (95% CI: 31.0% to 36.8%), the 8–30-day mortality ranged from cerebral failure, 3.9% (95% CI: 2.8% to 5.3%), to hepatic failure, 8.6% (95% CI: 6.6% to 10.8%) and 31–365-day mortality ranged from cerebral failure, 9.3% (95% CI: 7.6% to 11.2%), to renal failure, 18.2% (95% CI: 15.5% to 21.1%). Conclusions The study revealed an incidence of new organ failure at 1342/100 000 person-years and a prevalence of 5.2% of all emergency department contacts. One-year all-cause mortality was 29.8% among organ failure patients.