Objective: To determine the outcome of severe dengue viral infection (DVI) and the main dengue fatality risk factors.
Study design: The medical records of patients aged <15 years admitted to Songklanagarind Hospital in southern Thailand during 1989-2011 were reviewed. Patients who had dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF) grades III-IV, organ failure (cardiovascular, respiratory, liver, renal or hematologic), impaired consciousness, or aspartate aminotransferase more than 1,000 units/L, were classified as having severe DVI. To determine the fatality risk factors of severe DVI, the classification trees were constructed based on manual recursive partitioning.
Results: Of the 238 children with severe DVI, 30 (12.6%) died. Compared to the non-fatal DVI cases, the fatal cases had higher rates of DHF grade IV (96.7% vs 24.5%), repeated shock (93.3% vs 27.9%), acute respiratory failure (ARF) (100% vs 6.7%), acute liver failure (ALF) (96.6% vs 6.3%), acute kidney injury (AKI) (79.3% vs 4.5%), and active bleeding requiring blood transfusion (93.3% vs 5.4%), all p<0.01. The combined risk factors of ARF and active bleeding considered together predicted fatal outcome with sensitivity, specificity, and negative and positive predictive values of 0.93 (0.78-0.99), 0.97 (0.93-0.99), 0.99 (0.97-1.00), and 0.82 (0.65-0.93), respectively. The likelihood ratios for a fatal outcome in the patients who had and did not have this risk combination were 32.4 (14.6-71.7) and 0.07 (0.02-0.26), respectively.
Conclusion: Severe DVI patients who have ARF and active bleeding are at a high risk of death, while patients without these things together should survive.