Antithrombin III in patients admitted to intensive care units: a multicenter observational study

Table 1 Characteristics of the 216 patients enrolled in our observational study and of the subgroup of 56 patients treated for sepsis

	Overall group of patients		Patient subgroup with sepsis
Patients' characteristics	n	Characteristics	n	Characteristics
Age (years)	208	62.0 ± 17.2	52	61.8 ± 16.7
Sex (male, female)	211	146, 65	52	38, 14
Body weight (kg)	162	75.5 ± 9.2	48	77.9 ± 16.2
ATIII level at baseline (%)	209	57.4 ± 18.2	55	54.3 ± 14.9
Congenital deficiency	180	1 (0.5%)	47	0 (0%)
Ward of admission (surgery, other)	204	111, 93	51	27, 24
Administration of antibiotics	199	179 (83%)	53	50 (89%)
Administration of heparin	202	107 (50%)	54	28 (50%)
Daily dose of ATIII (units per patient)	195	1758 ± 1092	47	1988 ± 981
Duration of administration of ATIII (days)	195	3.1 ± 4.1	47	3.5 ± 2.6

n is the number of evaluable patients. Where errors are shown these are SDs. The daily doses of ATIII according to the clinical indications were as follows: sepsis (n = 47), 1988 ± 981 units/day; disseminated intravascular coagulation (n = 46), 1857 ± 967 units/day; other indications (n = 94), 1518 ± 1000 units/day. A one-way analysis of variance showed that these values were significantly different (F = 4.1; 2 and 184 degrees of freedom; P = 0.02); post-hoc tests showed that the only difference that reached significance was between sepsis and other indications (P = 0.03).

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