[Epidermiology of alcohol withdrawal syndrome. Mortality and factors of poor prognostic].
INTRODUCTION: Patients with alcoholism and alcohol withdrawal syndrome (AWS) have a worse prognostic. METHODS: We have performed a retrospective analysis of the hospital discharges in with diagnosis include AWS from 1 of January of 1997 to the 31 of December of 2002. RESULTS: We identified 924 hospital stays with 2.4% of mortality (1.6% in Internal Medicine). Mortality is associated with greater age (57 years +/-15 vs. 49+/- 13, p < 0.005), with the diagnostic of hepatic cirrhosis (6.2 vs. 1.8%, p < 0.005), bacteraemia (10 vs. 1.8%, p < 0.001) and respiratory infection (9.6 vs. 1.8%, p < 0,001), with a lower mortality when AWS was secondary diagnosis (1.2 vs. 4.2%, p < 0.005). In multivariant analysis were associated with more mortality age (OR 1.03), hepatic cirrhosis (OR 3.4), bacteriemia (OR 4.5) and respiratory infection (OR 3.6). CONCLUSION: Alcohol withdrawal syndrome mortality could to benefit from treatment in an Internal Medicine Service.