In this retrospective study of 98 pediatric patients with traumatic brain injury, both the pediatric Glasgow Coma Scale score (area under the curve 0.881) and admission lactate-to-albumin ratio (area under the curve 0.854) demonstrated strong and comparable prognostic performance for mortality prediction, outperforming other inflammatory indices. Elevated lactate-to-albumin ratio, along with higher systemic inflammatory markers (systemic inflammation response index, neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio, pan-immune-inflammation value, systemic immune-inflammation index) and procalcitonin, was significantly associated with mortality, supporting the use of readily available laboratory indices for early risk stratification in pediatric traumatic brain injury.

Source: Medicine