Childhood obesity among school children is currently not a prevalent health problem in Kota Kinabalu. However, the complication of childhood obesity is serious. Authorities should address this problem through the education of parents and children towards living a healthy lifestyle, encompassing teaching of healthy eating habits and encouragement of physical activities in school or leisure time should be promoted among all age groups. Pregnant and lactating women should be given advice on exclusive breast feeding to prevent childhood obesity. Early detection of obesity and hypertension are important. It will be useful to determine what factors in Kota Kinabalu enable a lower prevalence of obesity compared to the higher prevalence areas in the country. This could provide important information to design strategies to reduce obesity among school children nation wide.

INTRODUCTIONMortality risk prediction scores are important for benchmarking quality of care in paediatric intensive care units (PICUs). We aimed to benchmark PICU outcomes at our hospital against the Pediatric Index of Mortality 2 (PIM2) mortality risk prediction score, and evaluate differences in diagnosis on admission and outcomes between Malaysian and immigrant children.

METHODSWe prospectively collected demographic and clinical data on paediatric medical patients admitted to the PICU of Sabah Women's and Children's Hospital in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia. The PIM2 risk score for mortality was tabulated.

RESULTSOf the 131 patients who met the inclusion criteria, data was available for 115 patients. The mean age of the patients was 2.6 ± 3.8 years, with 79% of the cohort aged less than five years. Patients were mainly of Kadazan (38%) and Bajau (30%) descent, and 26% of patients were non-citizens. Leading diagnoses on admission were respiratory (37%), neurological (18%) and infectious (17%) disorders. Out of the 29 patients who died, 23 (79%) were Malaysians and the main mortality diagnostic categories were respiratory disorder (22%), septicaemia (22%), haemato-oncological disease (17%) and neurological disorder (13%). Calculated standardised mortality ratios (SMRs) were not significantly > 1 for any patient category for variables such as age and admission diagnosis. However, infants less than two years old with comorbidities were significantly worse (SMR 2.61, 95% confidence interval 1.02-6.66).

CONCLUSIONThe patient profile at our centre was similar to that reported from other PICUs in Asia. The PIM2 score is a useful mortality risk prediction model for our population.

Adolescent ; Borneo ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Comorbidity ; Critical Care ; methods ; Critical Illness ; mortality ; Female ; Humans ; Infant ; Intensive Care Units, Neonatal ; Intensive Care Units, Pediatric ; Malaysia ; Male ; Mortality ; Prospective Studies ; Quality of Health Care ; Risk Assessment ; Severity of Illness Index