Time Matters, Think Sepsis, Say Centers for Disease Control

Healthcare providers are the critical link to preventing, recognising, and treating sepsis, say the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in their Vital Signs report on sepsis, which was released on 23 August. Patients and their families should also be alert to sepsis, they add.

Sepsis begins outside hospital for 80% of patients, yet a recent chart review of hospital patients admitted with sepsis, published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality  Weekly Report, showed that 7 out of 10 had recently used healthcare services, and their symptoms were missed (Novosad et al. 2016).

Call for Action

The CDC say that healthcare providers can:

• Prevent infections
• Educate patients and their families
• Think sepsis
• Act fast - order tests and start antibiotics if sepsis is suspected
• Reassess patient management - check patient progress often

Health care facility CEOs/administrators can:

• Make infection control a priority. Ensure a strong link between infection control and prevention, sepsis early recognition, and appropriate antibiotic use programmes.
• Train healthcare providers and frontline staff to quickly recognise and treat sepsis.
• Collaborate with health departments and other healthcare facilities within their area to improve infection control.

CDC is working on five key areas related to sepsis:

1. Increasing sepsis awareness by engaging clinical professional organisations and patient advocates.
2. Aligning infection prevention, chronic disease management, and appropriate antibiotic use to promote early recognition of sepsis.
3. Studying risk factors for sepsis that can guide focused prevention and early recognition.
4. Developing tracking for sepsis to measure impact of successful interventions.
5. Preventing infections that may lead to sepsis by promoting vaccination programs, chronic disease management, infection prevention, and appropriate antibiotic use.

The CDC (@CDCgov) urges people to tweet with the hashtag #ThinkSepsis.

Watch The Story of Nile Moss: One Family’s Struggle with Sepsis (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

See Also: New Sepsis Guidelines for England

Source and image credit: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention