Table 6.

Risk factors for inappropriate antibiotic administration

	Appropriate antibiotics within 1 h n = 24	Appropriate antibiotics later than 1 h n = 63	P value	“Early appropriate antibiotic treatment” n = 20	No “early appropriate antibiotic treatment” n = 67	P value
Age (years) (SD)	73 (13)	72 (16)	0.879	71 (13)	73 (16)	0.667
Female sex (%)	12 (50)	33 (52.4)	0.843	10 (50)	35 (52.2)	0.860
Immunosuppression, any (%)	11 (45.8)	13 (20.6)	0.019	10 (50)	14 (20.9)	0.011
Inadequate empiric antibiotic(s) (%)	1 (4.2) n = 23	6 (9.7) n = 56	0.668	19 (95.0	60 (90.9)	0.999
Misdiagnosed focus of infection (%)	2 (8.3) n = 24	10 (16.1) n = 62	0.496	2 (10) n = 20	10 (15.2) n = 66	0.724
Triage level according to METTS* (SD)	1.2 (0.5) n = 23	2 (0.7) n = 57	< 0.001	1.2 (0.5) n = 19	1.9 (0.8) n = 61	< 0.001
APACHE II (SD)	22.7 (5.2)	18.4 (6.2)	0.004	22.1 (5.1)	18.8 (6.4)	0.037
SOFA score at arrival (SD)	4.8 (2.7)	3.2 (2.3)	0.009	4.4 (2.0)	3.4 (2.6)	0.120
Arrival with ambulance (%)	22 (95.7) n = 23	48 (76.2) n = 63	0.058	18 (94.7) n = 19	52 (77.6) n = 67	0.108
Limitation of level of care (%)	6 (25)	15 (23.8)	0.908	4 (20)	17 (25.4)	0.770
Administration of the first dose at another ward than ED (%)	1(4.2)	14 (22.2)	0.058	1 (5)	14 (20.9)	0.175

Data are presented as no. (%) or mean (SD) as indicated. The total study population and the high-risk patients are analysed separately. t Test, Pearson chi² or Fisher’s exact test, as appropriate. P values < 0.05 are shown in italics

*Red triage = 1, orange triage = 2, yellow triage = 3, green triage = 4