AUTHOR=Alshaikh Reem , AlKhalifah Ahmed , Fayed Amel , AlYousef Sawsan TITLE=Factors influencing the length of stay among patients admitted to a tertiary pediatric intensive care unit in Saudi Arabia JOURNAL=Frontiers in Pediatrics VOLUME=10 YEAR=2022 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/pediatrics/articles/10.3389/fped.2022.1093160 DOI=10.3389/fped.2022.1093160 ISSN=2296-2360 ABSTRACT=
This study aimed to assess the variables contributing to the length of stay in the pediatric intensive care unit. This study utilized a retrospective design by analyzing data from the Virtual Pediatric Systems web-based database. The study was conducted in a tertiary hospital—King Fahad Medical City in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia—from January 1, 2014 to December 31, 2019. The patients were admitted to intensive care with complex medical and surgical diseases. The variables were divided into quantitative and qualitative parameters, including patient data, Pediatric Risk of Mortality III score, and complications. Data from 3,396 admissions were analyzed. In this cohort, the median and mean length of stay were 2.8 (interquartile range, 1.08–7.04) and 7.43 (standard deviation, 14.34) days, respectively. The majority of long-stay patients—defined as those staying longer than 30 days—were less than 12 months of age (44.79%), had lower growth parameters (