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Research Article: Risk factors and a nomogram for predicting severe acute kidney injury in pediatric sepsis: a retrospective study

Date Published: 2026-07-20

Abstract:
To develop and validate a nomogram for predicting the risk of severe acute kidney injury (AKI) in children with sepsis. A total of 987 children with sepsis admitted to the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) of Hunan Children's Hospital between July 2018 and January 2021 were enrolled. Patients were stratified into a severe AKI group ( n =?228) and a no clinically significant AKI group ( n =?759) according to the severity of AKI during hospitalization. Based on independent risk factors identified by multivariate logistic regression, a predictive nomogram was constructed. Model performance was evaluated using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves, calibration curves, and decision curve analysis (DCA). Severe AKI occurred in 228 patients (23.1%). The mortality rate in the severe AKI group was 2.57-fold higher than that in the no clinically significant AKI group (31.1% vs. 12.5%, P <?0.05). Independent predictors of severe AKI included elevated phosphate (P 5+ ; per 1 mmol/L increase: OR =?2.789, 95% CI =?1.693–4.592, P <?0.001), decreased albumin (ALB; per 1?g/L increase: OR =?0.930, 95% CI =?0.879–0.984, P =?0.012), elevated uric acid (UA; per 1??mol/L increase: OR =?1.004, 95% CI =?1.003–1.005, P <?0.001), and reduced antithrombin III (AT3; per 1% increase: OR =?0.990, 95% CI =?0.980–0.999, P =?0.048). The logistic regression model showed moderate discrimination with an area under the ROC curve (AUC) of 0.782 ( 95% CI =?0.744–0.819). The corresponding nomogram achieved an AUC of 0.761 ( 95% CI =?0.724–0.797). At their optimal cutoff values, the model and nomogram yielded sensitivities of 60.10% and 62.70%, specificities of 85.40% and 80.80%, and Youden indices of 0.455 and 0.435, respectively. Severe AKI is strongly associated with increased mortality in pediatric sepsis. The nomogram incorporating P 5+ , ALB, UA, and AT3 shows moderate discrimination, acceptable calibration, and potential clinical utility for predicting severe AKI in children with sepsis.

Introduction:
Sepsis is a life-threatening organ dysfunction syndrome caused by a dysregulated host response to infection, and remains one of the most common conditions in the intensive care unit (ICU) ( 1 ). In the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU), approximately 26.9% of children with sepsis may develop acute kidney injury (AKI), with rapid disease progression and a mortality rate as high as 3.4% ( 2 , 3 ). Recent studies have shown that among children with sepsis in the PICU, those who develop severe AKI (KDIGO stages 2…

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