Abstract:

Background: Admission hyperglycemia has been reported to be associated with poor outcome among patients with major trauma. However, most of the available literature on this subject have been conducted in developed world. This study aimed to determine the association between admission hyperglycemia and outcome of major trauma patients admitted Bugando Medical Centre.

Methods: This was prospective cohort study, involving major traumatic admitted to Bugando Medical Centre (BMC) within 6 months from September 2017 to February 2018. The exposure being admission hyperglycemia (>11.1mmol/l) and non-exposure being normoglycemia (≤11.1mmol/l).

Results: A total of 217 patients (M: F ratio = 4.1: 1) were recruited. Their ages ranged from 4 – 97 years with the median age of 31 years. Out of 217 patients, 106 (48.8%) were hyperglycemic and the remaining 111(51.2%) were normoglycemic. The overall median days of length of hospital stay (LOS) was 15 days. There was no statistically significant association between admission hyperglycemia and LOS (p=0.875). In this study, 73 patients died giving a mortality of 33.6%. Patients with admission hyperglycemic patients (>11.1mmol/I) had significantly higher mortality as compared to normoglycemic patients (≤11.1mmol/l).

Conclusion: From this study, it was found that admission hyperglycemia is associated with increased mortality and complication rates among major trauma patients at Bugando Medical Centre. Therefore, there is a need to institute regular monitoring of blood sugar levels among these patients and give appropriate treatment for those found with deranged blood sugar levels.