Aim of this study was to develop a new simpler and more effective severity score for communityacquired pneumonia (CAP) patients. A total of 1640 consecutive hospitalized CAP patients in Second
Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang University were included. The effectiveness of different pneumonia
severity scores to predict mortality was compared, and the performance of the new score was validated
on an external cohort of 1164 patients with pneumonia admitted to a teaching hospital in Italy.
Using age≥ 65 years, LDH>230u/L, albumin<3.5g/dL, platelet count<100×109/L, confusion,
urea>7mmol/L, respiratory rate≥30/min, low blood pressure, we assembled a new severity score
named as expanded-CURB-65. The 30-day mortality and length of stay were increased along with
increased risk score. The AUCs in the prediction of 30-day mortality in the main cohort were 0.826
(95%CI, 0.807–0.844), 0.801 (95%CI, 0.781–0.820), 0.756 (95%CI, 0.735–0.777), 0.793 (95%CI,
0.773–0.813) and 0.759 (95%CI, 0.737–0.779) for the expanded-CURB-65, PSI, CURB-65, SMART-COP
and A-DROP, respectively. The performance of this bedside score was confirmed in CAP patients of
the validation cohort although calibration was not successful in patients with health care-associated
pneumonia (HCAP). The expanded CURB-65 is objective, simpler and more accurate scoring system for
evaluation of CAP severity, and the predictive efficiency was better than other score systems
