• Siva P Namachivayam, Janet Alexander, Anthony Slater, Johnny Millar, Simon Erickson, James Tibballs, Marino Festa, Subodh Ganu, Liz Segedin, Luregn J Schlapbach, Gary Williams, Frank Shann, Warwick Butt, and Paediatric Study Group and Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society.
• 1Department of Paediatric Intensive Care, Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, VIC, Australia. 2Murdoch Children's Research Institute, Melbourne, VIC, Australia. 3Australia and New Zealand Paediatric Intensive Care Registry, Brisbane, QLD, Australia. 4Paediatric Intensive Care Unit, Lady Cilento Children's Hospital, Children's Health Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia. 5Paediatric Intensive Care Unit, Princess Margaret Hospital, Perth, WA, Australia. 6Department of Paediatrics, University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC, Australia. 7Paediatric Intensive Care Unit, Children's Hospital at Westmead, Sydney, NSW, Australia. 8Paediatric Intensive Care Unit, Women's and Children's Hospital, Adelaide, SA, Australia. 9Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, Starship Children's Hospital, Auckland, New Zealand. 10Department of Pediatrics, Inselspital, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland. 11Paediatric Critical Care Research Group, Mater Research Institute, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia. 12Paediatric Intensive Care Unit, Sydney Children's Hospital, Sydney, NSW, Australia.
• Crit. Care Med. 2015 Sep 1; 43 (9): 1978-85.

ObjectiveOutcomes for children with chronic critical illness are not defined. We examined the long-term survival of these children in Australia and New Zealand.DesignAll cases of PICU chronic critical illness with length of stay more than 28 days and age 16 years old or younger in Australia and New Zealand from 2000 to 2011 were studied. Five-year survival was analyzed using Kaplan-Meir estimates, and risk factors for mortality evaluated using Cox regression.SettingAll PICUs in Australia and New Zealand.PatientsNine hundred twenty-four children with chronic critical illness.InterventionNone.Measurements And Main ResultsNine hundred twenty-four children were admitted to PICU for longer than 28 days on 1,056 occasions, accounting for 1.3% of total admissions and 23.5% of bed days. Survival was known for 883 of 924 patients (95.5%), with a median follow-up of 3.4 years. The proportion with primary cardiac diagnosis increased from 27% in 2000-2001 to 41% in 2010-2011. Survival was 81.4% (95% CI, 78.6-83.9) to PICU discharge, 70% (95% CI, 66.7-72.8) at 1 year, and 65.5% (95% CI, 62.1-68.6) at 5 years. Five-year survival was 64% (95% CI, 58.7-68.6) for children admitted in 2000-2005 and 66% (95% CI, 61.7-70) if admitted in 2006-2011 (log-rank test, p = 0.37). After adjusting for admission severity of illness using the Paediatric Index of Mortality 2 score, predictors for 5-year mortality included bone marrow transplant (hazard ratio, 3.66; 95% CI, 2.26-5.92) and single-ventricle physiology (hazard ratio, 1.98; 95% CI, 1.37-2.87). Five-year survival for single-ventricle physiology was 47.2% (95% CI, 34.3-59.1) and for bone marrow transplantation 22.8% (95% CI, 8.7-40.8).ConclusionsTwo thirds of children with chronic critical illness survive for at-least 5 years, but there was no improvement between 2000 and 2011. Cardiac disease constitutes an increasing proportion of pediatric chronic critical illness. Bone marrow transplant recipients and single-ventricle physiology have the poorest outcomes.

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