Letter to the Editor
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2022. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Crit Care Med. May 9, 2022; 11(3): 198-200
Published online May 9, 2022. doi: 10.5492/wjccm.v11.i3.198
Ideal scoring system for acute pancreatitis: Quest for the Holy Grail
Deven Juneja
Deven Juneja, Institute of Critical Care Medicine, Max Super Speciality Hospital, Saket, New Delhi 110017, India
Author contributions: Juneja D conducted the research, collected the data, and wrote and edited the manuscript
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Deven Juneja, DNB, FCCP, MBBS, Director, Institute of Critical Care Medicine, Max Super Speciality Hospital, Saket, 1, Press Enclave Road, Saket, New Delhi 110017, India. devenjuneja@gmail.com
Received: December 1, 2021
Peer-review started: December 1, 2021
First decision: January 12, 2022
Revised: January 12, 2022
Accepted: March 26, 2022
Article in press: March 26, 2022
Published online: May 9, 2022
Processing time: 157 Days and 1.6 Hours
Abstract

Clinical scoring systems are required to predict complications, severity, need for intensive care unit admission, and mortality in patients with acute pancreatitis. Over the years, many scores have been developed, tested, and compared for their efficacy and accuracy. An ideal score should be rapid, reliable, and validated in different patient populations and geographical areas and should not lose relevance over time. A combination of scores or serial monitoring of a single score may increase their efficacy.

Keywords: Acute pancreatitis; Scoring systems; Sequential organ failure assessment score

Core Tip: A score which is rapid, reproducible, reliable, and validated across different patient populations is ideally required to predict outcomes in acute pancreatitis. As most of the scores have similar efficacy, the choice of score in a particular center may depend on ease of computation and application. Sequential organ failure assessment score has been validated in various patient populations, is easy to compute and apply, and has withstood the test of time. Hence, it may be a good option, to predict outcomes in patients with acute pancreatitis.