To describe the characteristics of patients with HIV/AIDS and to compare the therapeutic interventions and end-of-life care before and after evaluation by the palliative care team.
This retrospective cohort study included all patients with HIV/AIDS admitted to the intensive care unit of the Instituto de Infectologia Emílio Ribas who were evaluated by a palliative care team between January 2006 and December 2012.
Of the 109 patients evaluated, 89% acquired opportunistic infections, 70% had CD4 counts lower than 100 cells/mm3, and only 19% adhered to treatment. The overall mortality rate was 88%. Among patients predicted with a terminally ill (68%), the use of highly active antiretroviral therapy decreased from 50.0% to 23.1% (p = 0.02), the use of antibiotics decreased from 100% to 63.6% (p < 0.001), the use of vasoactive drugs decreased from 62.1% to 37.8% (p = 0.009), the use of renal replacement therapy decreased from 34.8% to 23.0% (p < 0.0001), and the number of blood product transfusions decreased from 74.2% to 19.7% (p < 0.0001). Meetings with the family were held in 48 cases, and 23% of the terminally ill patients were discharged from the intensive care unit.
Palliative care was required in patients with severe illnesses and high mortality. The number of potentially inappropriate interventions in terminally ill patients monitored by the palliative care team significantly decreased, and 26% of the patients were discharged from the intensive care unit.
Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutical Science
3
2%
Social Sciences
3
2%
Agricultural and Biological Sciences
2
2%
Other
6
5%
Unknown
58
48%
Attention Score in Context
Attention Score in Context
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 4. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 25 April 2017.
All research outputs
#8,474,037
of 25,371,288 outputs
Outputs from Revista Brasileira de Terapia Intensiva
#97
of 350 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#126,409
of 399,662 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Revista Brasileira de Terapia Intensiva
#7
of 25 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 25,371,288 research outputs across all sources so far. This one has received more attention than most of these and is in the 66th percentile.
So far Altmetric has tracked 350 research outputs from this source. They receive a mean Attention Score of 3.4. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 71% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 399,662 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 68% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 25 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 72% of its contemporaries.
