Preoperative urinary neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin and outcome in high-risk heart failure patients undergoing cardiac surgery.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the ability of early urinary neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin to predict postoperative complications in adult patients with ventricular dysfunction undergoing cardiac surgery. DESIGN: Prospective observational study. SETTING: Single-center study, university hospital. PARTICIPANTS: Fifty-six adult high-risk cardiac surgical patients with preoperative cardiac failure. INTERVENTIONS: None. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: Demographic and clinical characteristics were obtained, and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin was measured at baseline and at several time points after surgery. Patient characteristics and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin levels were related to renal and patient outcome. On multivariate analyses, preoperative urinary neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin was an independent predictor of length of intensive care stay (p = 0.004) and in-hospital stay (p = 0.04), but not of acute kidney injury or renal replacement therapy and was not associated with baseline renal function. CONCLUSIONS: In a cohort of high-risk cardiac surgery patients, preoperative urinary neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin value provided prognostic information that was independent of the onset of acute kidney injury or of preoperative renal function.