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- Ahlström, Björn, et al.
(author)
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A comparison of impact of comorbidities and demographics on 60-day mortality in ICU patients with COVID-19, sepsis and acute respiratory distress syndrome
- 2022
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In: Scientific Reports. - : Springer Nature. - 2045-2322. ; 12
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Severe Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is associated with several pre-existing comorbidities and demographic factors. Similar factors are linked to critical sepsis and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). We hypothesized that age and comorbidities are more generically linked to critical illness mortality than a specific disease state. We used national databases to identify ICU patients and to retrieve comorbidities. The relative importance of risk factors for 60-day mortality was evaluated using the interaction with disease group (Sepsis, ARDS or COVID-19) in logistic regression models. We included 32,501 adult ICU patients. In the model on 60-day mortality in sepsis and COVID-19 there were significant interactions with disease group for age, sex and asthma. In the model on 60-day mortality in ARDS and COVID-19 significant interactions with cohort were found for acute disease severity, age and chronic renal failure. In conclusion, age and sex play particular roles in COVID-19 mortality during intensive care but the burden of comorbidity was similar between sepsis and COVID-19 and ARDS and COVID-19.
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- Ahlström, Björn, et al.
(author)
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A nationwide study of the long-term prevalence of dementia and its risk factors in the Swedish intensive care cohort
- 2020
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In: Critical Care. - : BMC. - 1364-8535 .- 1466-609X. ; 24:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- BackgroundDeveloping dementia is feared by many for its detrimental effects on cognition and independence. Experimental and clinical evidence suggests that sepsis is a risk factor for the later development of dementia. We aimed to investigate whether intensive care-treated sepsis is an independent risk factor for a later diagnosis of dementia in a large cohort of intensive care unit (ICU) patients.MethodsWe identified adult patients admitted to an ICU in 2005 to 2015 and who survived without a dementia diagnosis 1year after intensive care admission using the Swedish Intensive Care Registry, collecting data from all Swedish general ICUs. Comorbidity, the diagnosis of dementia and mortality, was retrieved from the Swedish National Patient Registry, the Swedish Dementia Registry, and the Cause of Death Registry. Sepsis during intensive care served as a covariate in an extended Cox model together with age, sex, and variables describing comorbidities and acute disease severity.ResultsOne year after ICU admission 210,334 patients were alive and without a diagnosis of dementia; of these, 16,115 (7.7%) had a diagnosis of sepsis during intensive care. The median age of the cohort was 61years (interquartile range, IQR 43-72). The patients were followed for up to 11years (median 3.9years, IQR 1.7-6.6). During the follow-up, 6312 (3%) patients were diagnosed with dementia. Dementia was more common in individuals diagnosed with sepsis during their ICU stay (log-rank p<0.001), however diagnosis of sepsis during critical care was not an independent risk factor for a later dementia diagnosis in an extended Cox model: hazard ratio (HR) 1.01 (95% confidence interval 0.91-1.11, p=0.873). Renal replacement therapy and ventilator therapy during the ICU stay were protective. High age was a strong risk factor for later dementia, as was increasing severity of acute illness, although to a lesser extent. However, the severity of comorbidities and the length of ICU and hospital stay were not independent risk factors in the model.ConclusionAlthough dementia is more common among patients treated with sepsis in the ICU, sepsis was not an independent risk factor for later dementia in the Swedish national critical care cohort.Trial registrationThis study was registered a priori with the Australian and New Zeeland Clinical Trials Registry (registration no. ACTRN12618000533291).
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- Ahlström, Björn
(author)
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The epidemiology of risk factors and short and long-term outcome in the Swedish intensive care cohort
- 2021
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Licentiate thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Dissertation presented at Uppsala University to be publicly examined on Zoom: https://uu-se.zoom.us/j/7214327760, Tuesday, 11 May 2021 at 13:00 for the degree of Licentiate of Philosophy (Faculty of Medicine). The examination will be conducted in English and Swedish. Chairman of the Examining committee: Professor Karl Michaëlsson (Medical epidemiology, Department of Surgical Sciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala) Abstract Ahlström, B. 2021. The epidemiology of risk factors and short- and long-term out-come in the Swedish intensive care cohort. 76 pp. Severe sepsis and septic shock, linked to persistent organ dysfunctions, have poor short- and long-term mortality outcomes. These conditions also adversely affect health-related quality of life. After intensive care with severe sepsis and septic shock, memory and other cognitive functions have shown deterioration. In addition, there are indications of an increased risk of dementia. Yet, whether severe sepsis and septic shock are independently linked to dementia or dementia development is linked to more general severe illness remains unclear. In the Swedish intensive care cohort we compared 16 115 one-year sepsis survivors without previous dementia to 194 219 patients (controls) admitted to intensive care for other reasons using a Cox proportional hazards model. The crude risk of dementia was increased in the severe sepsis and septic shock group. However, after adjustment for demographics, comorbidities and factors reflecting the severity of acute illness, severe sepsis and septic shock was found not to be a significant risk factor of incident dementia with a haz-ard ratio of 1.01 (95% confidence interval 0.91-1.11). Thus, we concluded that although the incidence of dementia is high after intensive care, severe sepsis or septic shock is not causative. Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has put a tremendous strain on the healthcare system in general and intensive care, in particular, since its emergence in Wuhan, China, in late 2019. Risk factors of ICU admission and mortality from COVID-19 were reported early during the pandemic, but only as univariate variables. Under the hypothesis that there are several independent risk factors of critical COVID-19, we used statistical models to explore demographic characteristics and comorbidi-ties in the first 1 981 ICU-admitted patients with COVID-19 in Sweden. On the risk of ICU admission, we also included matched population controls in a 1:4 ratio. Hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus, chronic renal failure, asthma, obesity, solid organ transplant recipient and immunosuppressant medications were independent risk factors of ICU admission. Oral anticoagulants were associated with a protective effect. Stroke, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and treatment with renin-angiotensin-aldosterone inhibitors were independent risk factors of ICU mortality. Treatment with statins was protective. Our findings suggest that there are several independent risk factors of ICU admission and ICU mortality in COVID-19.Björn Ahlström, Department of Surgical Sciences, Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care, Uppsala University, SE-75185 Uppsala, Sweden and Centre of clinical research, Region Dalarna, SE-79182 Falun, Sweden.
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- Ahlström, Björn
(author)
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The epidemiology of risk factors and short- and long-term outcome in the Swedish intensive care cohort
- 2024
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The sepsis syndrome is present in ¼ to ⅓ of patients in intensive care units (ICUs) worldwide. The short-term prognosis is grim, with a 30-day mortality of 30–35%; however, the long- term outcomes are now being explored, as multi-professional follow-up after ICU care is increasingly being implemented. In 2020 the first and second waves of another severe infection, the Coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) hit Sweden. The number of ICU beds were scaled up by several hundred percent while we simultaneously tried to understand the disease. Reports on risk factors for adverse outcomes in Covid-19 started to appear, but we needed to know more. Thus, we initiated this project aiming at assessing sepsis as an independent risk factor for later morbidity and mortality. Subsequently, with the onset of the pandemic, our focus shifted to identifying risk factors for adverse outcomes in Covid-19 and describing the functional recovery after severe Covid-19. We used the Swedish Intensive Care Registry and several governmental registries to this end.In Cox regression, we compared one-year ICU sepsis survivors without previous dementia with ICU patients without sepsis, finding no increased risk of dementia during follow- up. In a similar cohort, we assessed the impact of sepsis on long-term mortality and causes of death in a series of Cox and multinomial models. We found a surprisingly small overall association between sepsis and mortality and a persistently increased risk of infectious causes of death in sepsis patients. We compared the prevalence of several common comorbidities and medications as risk factors for ICU admission and mortality in ICU patients with Covid-19 with that of age- and sex-matched population controls and in patients discharged alive with those that were deceased at discharge. We found associations between several comorbidities and medications with these adverse outcomes. To better understand the meaning of these comorbidities as risk factors for short-term mortality, we compared them in logistic regression models on patients with Covid-19, sepsis and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). We found very similar impacts from the comorbidities; however, greater age was more associated with mortality in Covid-19 than in either sepsis or ARDS. Finally, we investigated the long-term functional recovery in ICU patients with Covid-19 compared to hospital-admitted patients with Covid-19 and population controls matched to the ICU group. The ICU patients had a markedly impeded recovery that was not explained by demographics or comorbidities in statistical models.
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- Ahlström, Björn, et al.
(author)
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The swedish covid-19 intensive care cohort : Risk factors of ICU admission and ICU mortality
- 2021
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In: Acta Anaesthesiologica Scandinavica. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 0001-5172 .- 1399-6576. ; 65:4, s. 525-533
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background: Several studies have recently addressed factors associated with severe Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19); however, some medications and comorbidities have yet to be evaluated in a large matched cohort. We therefore explored the role of relevant comorbidities and medications in relation to the risk of intensive care unit (ICU) admission and mortality.Methods: All ICU COVID-19 patients in Sweden until 27 May 2020 were matched to population controls on age and gender to assess the risk of ICU admission. Cases were identified, comorbidities and medications were retrieved from high-quality registries. Three conditional logistic regression models were used for risk of ICU admission and three Cox proportional hazards models for risk of ICU mortality, one with comorbidities, one with medications and finally with both models combined, respectively.Results: We included 1981 patients and 7924 controls. Hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus, chronic renal failure, asthma, obesity, being a solid organ transplant recipient and immunosuppressant medications were independent risk factors of ICU admission and oral anticoagulants were protective. Stroke, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and treatment with renin-angiotensin-aldosterone inhibitors (RAASi) were independent risk factors of ICU mortality in the pre-specified primary analyses; treatment with statins was protective. However, after adjusting for the use of continuous renal replacement therapy, RAASi were no longer an independent risk factor.Conclusion: In our cohort oral anticoagulants were protective of ICU admission and statins was protective of ICU death. Several comorbidities and ongoing RAASi treatment were independent risk factors of ICU admission and ICU mortality.
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- Björklund, Fredrik, et al.
(author)
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Recent work: Motivational internalism
- 2012
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In: Analysis. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 0003-2638 .- 1467-8284. ; 72:1, s. 124-137
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Research review (peer-reviewed)
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- Björklund, Fredrik, et al.
(author)
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Recent Work on Motivational Internalism
- 2012
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In: Analysis. - Oxford, UK : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 0003-2638 .- 1467-8284. ; 72:1, s. 124-137
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Reviews recent work on motivational internalism.
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