ESTIMATION OF MORTALITY IN THE INTENSIVE CARE UNITS IN IRAN: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW AND META-ANALYSIS

The mortality rate index in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) can be used to evaluate new treatments and specialist human resources and optimize resource allocation. Mortality in the ICUs of Iranian hospitals has been sporadically reported. The purpose of this study was to estimate the overall mortality rate of ICU patients in Iranian hospitals.

A systematic review was conducted in SID, MagIran, PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar for related articles until November 2019. Also, the reference lists of key studies were checked for additional citations. Quality assessment of studies was performed using the STROBE checklist. The results of the studies were analyzed using Comprehensive Meta-Analysis (CMA) software version 2.

Twenty-six studies involving 8980 patients were included in the review. The findings of the meta-analysis indicated that the overall mortality in ICU patients was 29.8% (95% CI, 0.259_0.34; P<.05). The prevalence of mortality in men and women was 29.8% (95% CI, 0.211_0.389; P<.05) and 29.2% (95% CI, 0.235_0.369; P<.05), respectively.

Mortality rate in ICU patients in Iranian hospitals is high compared to other countries. Therefore, resources and facilities should be considered in the ICUs.