Characteristics of mortality by sepsis at the province of Matanzas

Abstract

Sepsis is defined as the systemic inflammatory answer to an infection, implying the stimulation of the host inflammatory answer caused by an infecting organism or their products. It may progress to more serious stages and lead to organic multiple dysfunction and death. We developed a transversal retrospective, descriptive study of the deceases by sepsis occurring in Matanzas from 2001 to 2006. The average of life-years gained per decease in death for all causes was higher than that showed by those died by sepsis (71,6 vs. 68.6 respectively) while the average of life-years lost to decease in death for all the causes was inferior than the one showed by deceases for sepsis (17.3 vs. 20.5 respectively). Female sex predominated among those deceased for sepsis and male among those who died for all the causes, both differences statistically significant. Deceases for sepsis showed a curve similar to that followed by mortality for all the causes, with a tendency to increase in direct relation with age. There were not substantial differences between groups when compared according to ethnicity. The crude mortality rate for all the causes by municipality was 33.1 times higher than the one for sepsis, ranging from 44.3 to 21.7. We arrived to the conclusion that it would be recommendable to study definite characteristics and that there is not any explanation for the genre differences found, neither for hypothesis that arose in this work, recommending to analyze little studied variables and to begin new investigations with new designs.