Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41968305›Full record

ArticleCritical care (London, England)2026

Admission-day SOFA-2 versus SOFA for mortality discrimination: external validation in a large multicenter ICU database.

Yudai Iwasaki, Takahiro Kinoshita, Jumpei Yoshimura, Shuhei Maruyama, Shinichiro Ohshimo, Shuhei Murao, Makoto Watanabe, Kenichiro Uchida, Yutaka Igarashi, Yuji Nishimoto and 11 more

Abstract readMulticenter Study
In one paragraph

Article in Critical care (London, England), 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
2citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

2 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

21 authors.

Yudai IwasakiDepartment of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine, Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine, Sendai, Japan.
Takahiro KinoshitaMeDiCU, Inc., 1-15-23 Higashinakamoto, Higashinari-ku, Osaka, 537-0021, Osaka, Japan. takahiro.kinoshita@medicu.co.jp.ORCID http://orcid.org/0009-0007-6761-2908
Jumpei YoshimuraMeDiCU, Inc., 1-15-23 Higashinakamoto, Higashinari-ku, Osaka, 537-0021, Osaka, Japan.
Shuhei MaruyamaDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Kansai Medical University Medical Center, Osaka, Japan.
Shinichiro OhshimoDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan.
Shuhei MuraoDivision of Trauma and Surgical Critical Care, Osaka General Medical Center, Sumiyoshiku, Osaka, Japan.
Makoto WatanabeDepartment of Emergency Medicine, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Kyoto, Japan.
Kenichiro UchidaDepartment of Traumatology and Critical Care Medicine, Osaka Metropolitan University, Osaka, Japan.
Yutaka IgarashiDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Nippon Medical School, Tokyo, Japan.
Yuji NishimotoDepartment of Cardiology, Toyonaka Municipal Hospital, Toyonaka, Osaka, Japan.
Shinshu KatayamaDepartment of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, Jichi Medical University Saitama Medical Center, Saitama, Japan.
Hiroshi KurosawaCenter for Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, Hyogo Prefectural Kobe Children's Hospital, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan.
Yoshiaki InoueDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, University of Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Japan.
Akira KodateDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Sapporo City General Hospital, Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan.
Keita IyamaAcute and Critical Care Center, Nagasaki University Hospital, Nagasaki, Japan.
Shigeaki InoueDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Wakayama Medical University, Wakayama, Japan.
Keisuke KanedaDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Center, Hyogo prefectural Nishinomiya Hospital, Nishinomiya, Japan.
Yusuke ItoDepartment of Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, Hyogo Prefectural Amagasaki General Medical Center, Amagasaki, Japan.
Hirotada KobayashiDepartment of Intensive Care Medicine, Kameda Medical Center, Kamogawa, Chiba, Japan.
Emiko NakatakiDepartment of Critical Care Medicine, Tokushima Prefectural Central Hospital, Tokushima, Japan.
Nobuaki ShimeDepartment of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

backgroundThe Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA)-2 score was developed to better reflect contemporary critical care practice by incorporating modern organ support modalities and updated thresholds based on recent data. However, the generalizability of this framework to intensive care unit (ICU) populations beyond the development cohort, particularly across organ support subgroups and major disease categories, remains uncertain. We aimed to evaluate the external validity of SOFA-2 using the OneICU database, a large Japanese critical care database with comprehensive domain-level data.

methodsAdult ICU stays between February 2013 and August 2025 were included and classified into two cohorts: those with complete SOFA-1 and SOFA-2 component data on the day of ICU admission, and those with complete SOFA-2 data on that day. Discriminatory performance for ICU mortality was evaluated using the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) and compared between SOFA-1 and SOFA-2 using the DeLong test. Subgroup analyses were performed by major organ support device use and across disease categories.

resultsAmong 152,883 eligible ICU stays, 67,116 had complete SOFA-1 and SOFA-2 data, and 121,443 had complete SOFA-2 data. SOFA-2 showed a slightly higher AUROC for ICU mortality than SOFA-1 (0.859 vs. 0.853; p < 0.001), although the absolute difference was small. Across subgroups defined by mechanical circulatory support use, SOFA-2 showed higher discrimination than SOFA-1. Discrimination was similar in other device-defined subgroups and in patients readmitted to the ICU. SOFA-2 also demonstrated good discrimination across major diagnostic groups.

conclusionsSOFA-2 showed similar discrimination for ICU mortality compared with SOFA-1 and maintained broadly comparable performance across clinically relevant subgroups, supporting its applicability for early severity assessment in heterogeneous ICU populations.

Indexed as

Hospital MortalityOrgan Dysfunction ScoresAgedDatabases, FactualFemaleHumansIntensive Care UnitsJapanMaleMiddle AgedROC CurveIntensive care unit, external validitySequential organ failure assessment

Identifiers

PMID41968305
PMCPMC13185306

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.