“Red cell distribution width is a robust predictor of… all-cause patient mortality.”
I saw this article when I was browsing abstracts, and I thought, “Huh! That sounds interesting, though, probably not relevant.”
So, yes, increasing red cell distribution width is associated with increased mortality. However – and this is something I’ve never seen before in an article – looking at the table describing the differences between their various divisions of RDW% – every other descriptive statistic is different between groups. More septic patients with high RDW%. More renal failure. Differences in hematocrit. More organ failure. They claim by statistical multivariate massage, that RDW shakes out as an independent factor, but, sheesh…it’s almost like saying decrease in temperature is highly associated with death, when they’re cold because the blood isn’t circulating, the breathing has stopped, the brain has shut down, etc….
Another fine example of where reading the abstract is absolutely no replacement for perusing the article.