The prediction of death up to 100 days after admission to hospital for acute medical illness - The comparison of two ECG interpretation methods with ECG-dispersion mapping

Abstract

Background: the prognostic performances of different ECG interpretation methods have not been compared. Methods: the 100 day mortality of 513 patients predicted by Marquette proprietary ECG software, Tan et al's scoring system and the myocardial micro-alternation index (MMI) were compared. Results: 33 patients (6.4%) died within 100 days of hospital admission. The c statistics for Marquette and Tan ECG interpretation and MMI were not statistically different (i.e. 0.64, 0.68 and 0.73, respectively). Only MMI was independent from age as a predictor of mortality. The c statistic for MMI plus age of 0.81 was significantly higher than that of Marquette ECG interpretation (p 0.015). Conclusion: predictions of 100 day mortality by of all three ECG interpretation methods are equivalent.