Clinical and organizational risk factors for mortality during deterioration events among pediatric oncology patients in Latin America: A multicenter prospective cohort.

BACKGROUND: Hospitalized pediatric hematology-oncology (PHO) patients have frequent clinical deterioration events (CDE) requiring intensive care unit (ICU) admission, particularly in resource-limited settings. The objective of this study was to describe CDEs in hospitalized PHO patients in Latin America and to identify event-level and center-level risk factors for mortality. METHODS: In 2017, the authors implemented a prospective registry of CDEs, defined as unplanned transfers to a higher level of care, use of ICU-level interventions on the floor, or nonpalliative floor deaths, in 16 PHO centers in 10 countries. PHO hospital admissions and hospital inpatient days were also reported. This study analyzes the first year of registry data (June 2017 to May 2018). RESULTS: Among 16 centers, 553 CDEs were reported in PHO patients during 11,536 admissions and 119,414 inpatient days (4.63 per 1000 inpatient days). Event mortality was 29% (1.33 per 1000 inpatient days) but ranged widely across centers (11%-79% or 0.36-5.80 per 1000 inpatient days). Significant risk factors for event mortality included requiring any ICU-level intervention on the floor and not being transferred to a higher level of care. Events with organ dysfunction, a higher severity of illness, and a requirement for ICU intervention had higher mortality. In center-level analysis, hospitals with a higher volume of PHO patients, less floor use of ICU intervention, lower severity of illness on transfer, and lower rates of floor cardiopulmonary arrest had lower event mortality. CONCLUSIONS: Hospitalized PHO patients who experience CDEs in resource-limited settings frequently require floor-based ICU interventions and have high mortality. Modifiable hospital practices around the escalation of care for these high-risk patients may contribute to poor outcomes. Earlier recognition of critical illness and timely ICU transfer may improve survival in hospitalized children with cancer.

Reliability and validity of a Spanish-language measure assessing clinical capacity to sustain Paediatric Early Warning Systems (PEWS) in resource-limited hospitals.

BACKGROUND: Paediatric Early Warning Systems (PEWSs) improve identification of deterioration, however, their sustainability has not been studied. Sustainability is critical to maximise impact of interventions like PEWS, particularly in low-resource settings. This study establishes the reliability and validity of a Spanish-language Clinical Sustainability Assessment Tool (CSAT) to assess clinical capacity to sustain interventions in resource-limited hospitals. METHODS: Participants included PEWS implementation leadership teams of 29 paediatric cancer centres in Latin America involved in a collaborative to implement PEWS. The CSAT, a sustainability assessment tool validated in high-resource settings, was translated into Spanish and distributed to participants as an anonymous electronic survey. Psychometric, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and multivariate analyses were preformed to assess reliability, structure and initial validity. Focus groups were conducted after participants reviewed CSAT reports to assess their interpretation and utility. RESULTS: The CSAT survey achieved an 80% response rate (n=169) with a mean score of 4.4 (of 5; 3.8-4.8 among centres). The CSAT had good reliability with an average internal consistency of 0.77 (95% CI 0.71 to 0.81); and CFAs supported the seven-domain structure. CSAT results were associated with respondents' perceptions of the evidence for PEWS, its implementation and use in their centre, and their assessment of the hospital culture and implementation climate. The mean CSAT score was higher among respondents at centres with longer time using PEWS (p<0.001). Focus group participants noted the CSAT report helped assess their centre's clinical capacity to sustain PEWS and provided constructive feedback for improvement. CONCLUSIONS: We present information supporting the reliability and validity of the CSAT tool, the first Spanish-language instrument to assess clinical capacity to sustain evidence-based interventions in hospitals of variable resource levels. This assessment demonstrates a high capacity to sustain PEWS in these resource-limited centres with improvement over time from PEWS implementation.