Introduction:

New hospitals are replacing old facilities. There is little information on the performance of an intensive care unit (ICU) when it is relocated in a new and equipped area.

Objective:

To analyze the impact of the change of ICU facilities from a shared environment to individual beds on the occurrence of adverse events.

Method:

Cross-sectional, comparative study, with prospectively collected data from patients admitted from March 01, 2014 to February 28, 2017 to the former ICU (f-ICU) and from July 17, 2017 to January 17, 2019 to the new ICU (n-ICU) of a public teaching hospital. The rate of adverse events was measured in events per 1,000 patient-days.

Results:

Among 1,188 patients (f-ICU, n = 681 vs. n-ICU, n = 507), a reduction in the rate of unforeseen cardiac arrest (rate ratio: 0.31; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.12–0.80) and an increase in the rate of unplanned extubation (rate ratio: 2.49; 95% CI = 1.24–5.01) were observed, with both being statistically significant. The other nine monitored adverse events showed no changes.

Conclusions:

In comparison with the f-ICU, most of the monitored adverse events did not significantly change within the first 18 months of activities at the n-ICU.