CONTEXT AND OBJECTIVE: Patients are often admitted to intensive care units with delay in relation to when this service was indicated. The objective was to verify whether this delay influences hospital mortality, length of stay in the unit and hospital, and APACHE II prediction. DESIGN AND SETTING: Prospective and accuracy study, in intensive care unit of Santa Casa de São Paulo, a tertiary university hospital. METHODS: We evaluated all 94 patients admitted following emergency surgery, from August 2002 to July 2003. The variables studied were APACHE II, death risk, length of stay in the unit and hospital, and hospital mortality rate. The patients were divided into two groups according to the time elapsed between end of surgery and admission to the unit: up to 12 hours and over 12 hours. RESULTS: The groups were similar regarding gender, age, diagnosis, APACHE II score and hospital stay. The death risk factors were age, APACHE II and elapsed time (p < 0.02). The mortality rate for the over 12-hour group was higher (54% versus 26.1%; p = 0.018). For the over 12-hour group, observed mortality was higher than expected mortality (p = 0.015). For the up to 12-hour group, observed and expected mortality were similar (p = 0.288). CONCLUSION: APACHE II foresaw the mortality rate among patients that arrived faster to the intensive care unit, while the mortality rate was higher among those patients whose admission to the intensive care unit took longer.
APACHE; Intensive care units; Prognosis; Time factors; Hospital mortality