Sepsis: What Clinicians Should Do, and the Tools That Help

Sepsis is a medical emergency. Health care providers play a critical role: evaluate and treat anyone who might have sepsis immediately. With fast recognition and treatment, most patients survive.

Recognizing it

Common signs:

• fever
• fast heart rate
• low blood pressure

Testing

Tests look for signs of infection or organ damage, and some aim to find the germ behind the infection, such as:

• blood cultures for bacterial or fungal infections
• tests for viral infections such as influenza

Treating suspected sepsis

1. Follow your facility's policies and procedures for diagnosing and managing sepsis.
2. Alert the providers in charge of the patient's care right away, if that isn't you.
3. Start antibiotics as soon as possible, along with other appropriate therapies. If the specific bacterial cause is known, target the treatment — broad-spectrum antibiotics may not be needed.
4. Reassess early and often. Sepsis needs urgent care, usually in an intensive care unit, with close monitoring of vital signs, and regular review of the type and length of therapy.

Tools and training

• CDC: the Hospital Toolkit for Adult Sepsis Surveillance and the Hospital Sepsis Program Core Elements, for monitoring and improving hospital sepsis care.
• Guidelines and calculators: the Surviving Sepsis Campaign guidelines for adults and children; the emergency department Detect, Act, Reassess, Titrate (DART) tool; a pediatric sepsis change package; and a neonatal early-onset sepsis calculator for babies born after 34 weeks.
• Training: free education from the Sepsis Alliance Institute, and training videos for EMS crews on adult and pediatric sepsis.
• Materials: CDC's Get Ahead of Sepsis resources for patients and providers.

What to tell patients

• Prevent infections: consider a mask around people outside the household when respiratory viruses are spreading widely.
• Get recommended vaccines.
• Look after chronic conditions.
• Practice good hygiene: keep cuts and wounds clean and covered until healed, and keep hands clean.
• Know the signs and symptoms of sepsis, and act fast — it is an emergency.

Sources

Based on "Caring for Patients with Sepsis," Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; a work of the United States government in the public domain.