BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Pediatric index of mortality (PIM) 2 score is one of the 
severity scoring systems being used for predicting outcome of patients admitted 
to intensive care units (ICUs). The aim of the present study was to evaluate the 
usefulness of PIM2 score in predicting mortality in a tertiary care pediatric 
ICU (PICU) and to assess the associated factors in predicting mortality such as 
presence of shock, need for assisted ventilation and Glasgow coma scale <8.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: This was a prospective observation study done at tertiary 
care PICU from May 2011 to July 2011. Consecutive 119 patients admitted to PICU 
(aged 1 month to 12 years) were enrolled in the study. PIM2 scoring was done for 
all patients. The outcome was recorded as death or discharge. The associated 
factors for mortality were analyzed with SPSS 17.
RESULTS: PIM2 score discriminated between death and survival at a 99.8 cut-off, 
with area under receiver operating characteristic curve 0.843 with 95% 
confidence interval (CI) (0.765, 0.903). Most patients were referred late to 
this hospital, which explains higher death rate (46.2%), lesser length of 
hospital stay (mean 2.98 days) in the mortality group, and increased rate of 
mechanical ventilation (68.1%). Presence of shock was independently associated 
with mortality, as evidenced by binary logistic regression.
CONCLUSION: PIM2 score discriminated well between survivors and death at PICU. 
Presence of shock was significantly associated with mortality.