Measurement of PCT levels in addition to the clinical judgement may offer a solution for this diagnostic dilemma since our data suggest that baseline PCT levels greater than 1.1 ng/ml identify a group of ICU patients with a high risk to develop multiorgan dysfunction followed by death. The quality of mortality prediction was similar to the APACHE II score. These data confirm the observation by Luyt et al., who found a PCT threshold of 1 ng/ml to predict unfavorable outcome [19] .