Significance of Serum Ferritin in Multiple Trauma Patients with Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome

Purpose: Clinically, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) occurs within 72 hours after acute exposure of risk factors. Because of its high fatality rate once ARDS progresses, early detection and management are essential to reduce the mortality rate. Accordingly, studies on early changes of ARDS were started, and serum ferritin, as well the as injury severity score (ISS), which has been addressed in previous studies, thought to be an early predictive indicator for ARDSMethods: From March 2003 to March 2005, we investigated 50 trauma patients who were admitted to the intensive care unit in Dongguk University Medical Center, Gyeongju. The patients were characterized according to age, sex, ISS, onset of ARDS, time onset of ARDS, serum ferritin level (posttraumatic $1^{st}\;&\;2^{nd}$ day), amount of transfused blood, and death. Abdominal computed topography was performed as an early diagnostic tool to evaluate the onset of ARDS according to its diagnostic criteria. The serum ferritin was measured by using a $VIDAS^{(R)}$ Ferritin (bioMeriux, Marcy-1' Etoile, France) kit with an enzyme-linked fluorescent assay method. For statistical analysis, Windows SPSS 13.0 and MedCalc were used to confirm the probability of obtaining a predictive measure from the receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curve. Results: The ISS varied from 14 to 66 (mean: 33.8) whereas the onset of ARDS could be predicted with the score above 30 (sensitivity: 90.0%, specificity: 60.0%, p<0.05). On the posttraumatic $1^{st}$ day, the serum ferritin levels were measured to be from 31 mg/dL to 1,200 mg/dL (mean: 456 mg/dL), and the onset of ARDS could be predicted when the value was over 340 mg/dL (sensitivity: 80.0%, specificity: 65.0%, p<0.05). On the posttraumatic $2^{nd}$ day, the serum ferritin levels were measured to be from 73 mg/dL to 1,200 mg/dL (mean: 404 mg/dL), and the onset of ARDS could be predicted when the value was over 627 mg/dL (sensitivity: 60.0%, specificity: 92.5%, p<0.05). The serum ferritin levels and the ISS were significantly higher on the posttraumatic $1^{st}$ and $2^{nd}$ day in the ARDS group, suggesting that they are suitable indices predicting the onset of ARDS, however relationship between the serum ferritin levels and the ISS was not statistically significant. Conclusion: In this study, we discovered increasing serum ferritin levels in multiple- trauma patients on the posttraumatic $1^{st}$ & $2^{nd}$ day and concluded that both the serum ferritin level and the ISS were good predictors of ARDS. Although they do not show statistically significant relationship to each other, they can be used as independent predictive measures for ARDS. Since ARDS causes high mortality, further studies, including the types of surgery and the methods of anesthesia on a large number of patients are essential to predict the chance of ARDS earlier and to reduce the incidence of death.

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