Epidemiology of Pediatric Critical Care Admissions in 43 United States Children's Hospitals, 2014-2019

Abstract

Objectives: To identify trends in the population of patients in PICUs over time.

Design: Cross-sectional, retrospective cohort study using the Pediatric Health Information System database.

Setting: Forty-three U.S. children's hospitals.

Patients: All patients admitted to Pediatric Health Information System-participating hospitals from January 2014 to December 2019. Individuals greater than 65 years old and normal newborns were excluded.

Interventions: None.

Measurements and main results: PICU care occurred in 13.8% of all pediatric hospital encounters and increased over the study period from 13.3% to 14.3%. Resource intensity, based on average Hospitalization Resource Intensity Scores for Kids score, increased significantly across epochs (6.5 in 2014-2015 vs 6.9 in 2018-2019; p < 0.001), although this was not consistently manifested as additional procedural exposure. Geometric mean PICU cost per patient encounter was stable. The two most common disease categories in PICU patients were respiratory failure and cardiac and circulatory congenital anomalies. Of all PICU encounters, 35.5% involved mechanical ventilation, and 25.9% involved vasoactive infusions. Hospital-level variation in the percentage of days spent in the PICU ranged from 15.1% to 63.5% across the participating sites. Of the total hospital costs for patients admitted to the PICU, 41.7% of costs were accrued during the patients' PICU stay.

Conclusions: The proportional use of PICU beds is increasing over time, although was variable across centers. Case-based resource use and complexity of pediatric patients are also increasing. Despite the higher use of PICU resources, the standardized costs of PICU care per patient encounter have remained stable. These data may help to inform current PICU resource allocation and future PICU capacity planning.