Pancreatic injury is associated with poor prognosis in severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome

Severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS) is an emerging infectious disease. Previous studies have mainly focused on the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of patients with SFTS, while pancreatic injury has received little attention. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of pancreatic injury on the prognosis of patients with SFTS. A total of 156 SFTS patients were included in the analysis from April 2016 to April 2022. Multivariable logistic regression analysis showed that pancreatic injury (OR=3.754, 95% CI 1.361-79.036, P=0.024) and neurological symptoms (OR=18.648, 95% CI 4.921-70.668, P<0.001) were independent risk factors for patient death. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve indicated that serum pancreatic enzymes (PEs) were predictive of progression to death in SFTS patients. The area under the curve (AUC) for amylase (AMY) was 0.711, with an optimal cut-off value of 95.5 (U/L), sensitivity of 96.4%, and specificity of 35.9%. Lipase (LIP) had an AUC of 0.754, an optimal cut-off value of 354.75 (U/L), a sensitivity of 75%, and a specificity of 67.2%. Thus, pancreatic injury is associated with a poor prognosis of SFTS and can be used as an important reference for SFTS disease determination and prognostic assessment.