Dynamic rolling seventy of illness score for a critically ill patient

A system for identifying and managing high-risk patients comprising:

• a clinical setting for a first patient wherein the clinical setting includes a plurality of physiological monitors;
• an electronic device for a caregiver in the clinical setting;
• a first database that stores historical measurements in the clinical setting of a plurality of former patient physiological measurements and former patient outcomes of those former patients;
• wherein for each historical physiological measurement, dividing up the physiological measurements into ranges to form bins, wherein the distribution of bins results in the maximum variability in the historical mortality outcome rate;
• wherein each bin is assigned a different letter;
• in the first database, a set of trigger measurements based on early detection of perilous physiologic patterns in the historical physiological measurements, wherein those trigger measurements represent a set of historical physiological measurements that have been identified as indicating a high risk for a future negative patient outcome;
• a second database that receives and stores a plurality of current first patient physiological measurements and previous first patient physiological measurements from the plurality of the first patient physiological monitors;
• wherein the first patient physiological measurements occur at regular time segments;
• and
• wherein a letter is assigned for each time segment for each physiological measurement depending on which bin the physiological measurement is in;
• wherein the letters assigned for each first patient current time period and previous time period physiological measurement are saved, and the letters are collected for a predetermined time period which is comprised of a plurality of time segments;
• wherein the plurality of letters associated with each time period form a word, and further wherein the trigger is the word that indicates an increase in a chance of a negative patient outcome;
• wherein the word from the current time period and the word from the previous time period are used to detect if any words result in a trigger;
• a processor for comparing the first patient physiological measurements to the first database of historical measurements to identify a high-risk patient based on whether the first patient set of physiological measurements correspond to the first database trigger measurements using an exponential moving average of the number of trigger measurements over time to generate an acuity score that corresponds to the first patient's risk of an adverse event, wherein the exponential moving average is based on the first patient's current physiological measurements weighted more heavily than the first patient's previous physiological measurements;
• and
• an alert sent to the caregiver if the first patient is at a high risk for a negative outcome based on the comparing step.

A method for identifying and managing high-risk patients comprising the steps of:

• providing a clinical setting for a first patient wherein the setting includes a plurality of physiological monitors;
• providing electronic devices to a caregiver in the clinical setting;
• providing a first database that stores historical measurements of a plurality of former patient physiological measurements, former patient clinical interventions, and former patient outcomes of those former patients;
• wherein for each historical physiological measurement, dividing up the physiological measurements into ranges to form bins, wherein the distribution of bins results in the maximum variability in the historical mortality outcome rate;
• wherein each bin is assigned a different letter;
• defining trigger measurements based on the historical physiological measurements and historical clinical interventions, wherein those trigger measurements represent early detection of perilous physiologic patterns in a set of historical physiological measurements and historical clinical interventions that have been identified as indicating a high risk for a future negative patient clinical outcome;
• providing a second database that receives and stores a plurality of first patient physiological measurements from the plurality of the first patient physiological monitors and also stores the occurrence of clinical interventions;
• wherein the first patient physiological measurements occur at regular time segments;
• and
• wherein the letter is assigned for each time segment for each physiological measurement depending on which bin the physiological measurement is in
• wherein the letters assigned for each first patient current time period and previous time period physiological measurement are saved, and the letters are collected for a predetermined time period which is comprised of a plurality of time segments;
• wherein the plurality of letters associated with each time period form a word, and further wherein the trigger is the word that indicates an increase in a chance of a negative patient outcome;
• wherein the word from the current time period and the word from the previous time period are used to detect if any words result in a trigger;
• and
• comparing the first patient physiological measurements and clinical interventions to the first database of historical measurements to identify a high-risk patient based on whether the first patient set of physiological measurements and clinical interventions correspond to the first database trigger measurements;
• and
• sending an alert to the caregiver if the first patient is at a high risk for a negative outcome based on the comparing step.