ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Med.
Sec. Intensive Care Medicine and Anesthesiology
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmed.2025.1601033
This article is part of the Research TopicState of the Art in Acute Care Surgery: Application, Innovation, and Future PerspectivesView all 10 articles
Outcomes and Predictors of Mortality in Patients with Blunt Chest Trauma Admitted to the Intensive Care Unit: A Retrospective Study
Provisionally accepted
- 1College of Medicine and Health Sciences, United Arab Emirates University, AlAin, United Arab Emirates
- 2Al Ain Hospital, Al ain, United Arab Emirates
- 3Sheikh Khalifa Medical City, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
- 4Faculty of Medicine, October 6 university, Giza, Beni Suef, Egypt
- 5Tawam Hospital, Al Ain, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
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Background: Blunt chest trauma (BCT) accounts for 25% of trauma-related deaths. we aimed to explore the outcomes and predictors of mortality in patients with BCT admitted to a general intensive care unit (ICU). Methods: All patients with multiple traumas and BCT who were admitted to the ICU between December 2014 and January 2017 were retrospectively studied. Details on their injuries, demographic characteristics, Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) score, injury severity score, management, and mortality during ICU admission were retrieved from the hospital trauma registry. Results: Ninety-two patients were admitted to the ICU. Most cases of BCTs were caused by motor vehicle accidents (75%). Ten patients died (overall mortality: 10.9%). Simple logistic regression analysis identified GCS score, invasive mechanical ventilation, and acute physiology and chronic health evaluation II (APACHE II) score as significant predictors of mortality. Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that the APACHE II score was the best predictor of mortality. A one-unit increase in the APACHE II score corresponded to a 17% increase in the odds of death, and an APACHE II score of ≥15 had a sensitivity and specificity of 90% and 81.7%, respectively, in predicting ICU mortality. Discussion: BCTs were common among patients with polytrauma, and together with concomitant injuries leads to significant ICU resource utilization and worse outcomes. Conclusions: The APACHE II score, GCS score, and mechanical ventilation were significantly associated with mortality among patients with BCT admitted to the ICU. These factors may be considered for early ICU triage.
Keywords: APACHE II score, Blunt chest trauma, Lung contusion, Mortality, predictor
Received: 28 Mar 2025; Accepted: 25 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Soliman, Elkamhawy, Fathi, Zoubeidi and Alshamsi. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Fayez Alshamsi, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, United Arab Emirates University, AlAin, United Arab Emirates
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