Objective: To investigate high risk factors of intensive care unit-acquired weakness (ICUAW) in patients with sepsis.
Methods: A retrospective study was conducted. 164 patients with mechanical ventilation (MV) who were diagnosed sepsis and multiple organ dysfunction syndrome (MODS), admitted to intensive care unit (ICU) of the Second Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University from January 1st, 2015 to September 30th, 2017 were enrolled. The general situation, the basic diseases (hypertension, diabetes), body mass index (BMI), protopathy diseases, the level of albumin before ICU admission, the MV time, whether to use glucocorticoid and continuous renal replacement therapy (CRRT) or not, nutrition supply (nutritional way, nutrition initiation time, amino acid/protein supply, nutritional status on ICU 3 days and 7 days), myoglobin, the length of ICU stay, the length of hospital stay, and acute physiology and chronic health evaluation II (APACHE II) score were collected. The high risk factors of ICUAW in patients with sepsis complicated with MODS were analyzed further using multi-factor Logistic regression analysis. Multiple linear regression analysis was used to analyze the myoglobin related factors in sepsis patients.
Results: The ICUAW incidence was 25.6% (42/164). The risk factors with differences in univariate analysis were included in the multivariate Logistic regression analysis, and it was shown that the level of albumin before ICU [odds ratio (OR) = 0.232, 95% confidence interval (95%CI) = 0.061-0.885, P = 0.032], the MV time (OR = 0.380,95%CI = 0.154-0.935, P = 0.035), nutrition initiation time (OR = 2.642, 95%CI = 1.100-6.346, P = 0.030), myoglobin (OR = 4.129, 95%CI = 1.681-10.142, P = 0.002) were the independent risk factors for ICUAW in sepsis patients with MODS. The linear regression showed that the level of myoglobin was positively correlated with APACHE II score (β= 38.297, P = 0.000), negatively correlated with the length of hospital stay (β= -7.071, P = 0.048), and it had nothing to do with the MV time and the length of ICU stay.
Conclusions: Evaluation of muscle function should be a routine part of ICU examination. The levels of albumin, MV time, hemoglobin and nutritional start-up time were independent risk factors for ICUAW in sepsis patients with MODS. Myoglobin levels can be used as an indicator of severity.