Progression of the Radiologic Severity Index predicts mortality in patients with parainfluenza virus-associated lower respiratory infections

• Published in: PloS one 2018-05, Vol.13 (5), p.e0197418-e0197418
• Main Authors: Sheshadri, Ajay, Shah, Dimpy P, Godoy, Myrna, Erasmus, Jeremy J, Song, Juhee, Li, Liang, Evans, Scott E, Chemaly, Roy F, Dickey, Burton F, Ost, David E
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Biology and Life Sciences; Biopsy; Cancer; Chest x-rays; Clinical trials; Confidence intervals; Diagnosis; Disease control; Disease Progression; Hazard identification; Hematology; Hematopoietic stem cells; Humans; Infections; Infectious diseases; Intensive care; Lymphoma; Malignancy; Medicine; Medicine and Health Sciences; Mortality; Parainfluenza; Parainfluenza viruses; Patient outcomes; Patients; People and Places; Pneumonia; Rangefinding; Research and Analysis Methods; Respiratory tract; Respiratory tract diseases; Respiratory tract infection; Respiratory tract infections; Respiratory Tract Infections - diagnostic imaging; Respiratory Tract Infections - mortality; Respiratory Tract Infections - pathology; Respiratory Tract Infections - virology; Retrospective Studies; Rubulavirus - pathogenicity; Software; Statistical models; Stem cell transplantation; Stem cells; Systematic review; Tomography; Transplantation; Viral infections; Viruses
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0197418

Radiologic severity may predict adverse outcomes after lower respiratory tract infection (LRI). However, few studies have quantified radiologic severity of LRIs. We sought to evaluate whether a semi-quantitative scoring tool, the Radiologic Severity Index (RSI), predicted mortality after parainfluenza virus (PIV)-associated LRI. We conducted a retrospective review of consecutively-enrolled adult patients with hematologic malignancy or hematopoietic stem cell transplantation and with PIV detected in nasal wash who subsequently developed radiologically-confirmed LRI. We measured RSI (range 0-72) in each chest radiograph during the first 30 days after LRI diagnosis. We used extended Cox proportional hazards models to identify factors associated with mortality after onset of LRI with all-cause mortality as our failure event. After adjustment for patient characteristics, each 1-point increase in RSI was associated with an increased hazard of death (HR 1.13, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.05-1.21, p = 0.0008). Baseline RSI was not predictive of death, but both peak RSI and the change from baseline to peak RSI (delta-RSI) predicted mortality (odds ratio for mortality, peak: 1.11 [95%CI 1.04-1.18], delta-RSI: 1.14 [95%CI 1.06-1.22]). A delta-RSI of ≥19.5 was 89% sensitive and 91% specific in predicting 30-day mortality. We conclude that the RSI offers precise, informative and reliable assessments of LRI severity. Progression of RSI predicts 30-day mortality after LRI, but baseline RSI does not. Our results were derived from a cohort of patients with PIV-associated LRI, but can be applied in validated in other populations of patients with LRI.