BCAPS Study
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A prospective observational cohort study examining the utility of a novel risk stratification tool in community acquired pneumonia
IRAS ID
279554
Contact name
Davinder Dosanjh
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 0 months, 0 days
Research summary
Pneumonia is a leading cause of death from infectious disease. The severity of pneumonia can vary from mild illness which can be treated at home with tablet antibiotics, through to life-threatening severity causing multi-organ failure.
We know that being able to identify people who have severe forms of pneumonia at an early stage, such on the day of admission to hospital reduces mortality.
Identifying these patients is not always straightforward and doctors commonly use severity scoring tools to help inform their decision making. If a patient has a high severity score it enables the treating clinician to more rapidly escalate treatment, but also to not over treat individuals with low severity scores.
There are several established severity scores for pneumonia. We have demonstrated that although helpful these scores have some shortfalls in their ability to predict high mortality. For example, in some cases the score would say a patient has a low risk of death, but the patient then dies in hospital.
We have generated a new severity score which we believe is more accurate. To further validate the score, we need to collect data from a larger and more diverse group of patients
Lay summary of study results: Pneumonia is a leading cause of death from infectious disease. The severity of pneumonia can vary from mild illness which can be treated at home with tablet antibiotics, through to life-threatening severity causing multi-organ failure.
We know that being able to identify people who have severe forms of pneumonia at an early stage, such on the day of admission to hospital reduces mortality.
Identifying these patients is not always straightforward and doctors commonly use severity scoring tools to help inform their decision making. If a patient has a high severity score it enables the treating clinician to more rapidly escalate treatment, but also to not over treat individuals with low severity scores.
There are several established severity scores for pneumonia. We have demonstrated that although helpful these scores have some shortfalls in their ability to predict high mortality. For example, in some cases the score would say a patient has a low risk of death, but the patient then dies in hospital.
We have generated a new severity score which we believe is more accurate. To further validate the score, we need to collect data from a larger and more diverse group of patients.
In this study we recruited 1304 people admitted to hospital with pneumonia. Using their data we demonstrated that the new severity score is more accurate at predicting mortality than established scores, however it demonstrated similar limitations in predicting outcomes in older adults with multiple medical conditions. This means that it will need further development prior to clinical use.REC name
London - Queen Square Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
23/LO/0139
Date of REC Opinion
4 Apr 2023
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion