SIRS, a whole-body inflammatory response to the offending pathogen, is the real killer in sepsis. This infection can be fungal, viral, or parasitic, but the overwhelming majority of sepsis cases result from bacterial infection. Sepsis is defined as Systemic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (SIRS) in the presence of infection. With early recognition and stabilization, and collaboration with receiving hospitals, EMS Sepsis Alert programs have the potential to significantly lower the morbidity and mortality of sepsis. In one study, EMS transported more patients with severe sepsis than patients with STEMI or stroke, of which 19.6 percent died in-hospital. Given these factors, it is not surprising that early recognition and treatment of sepsis has become a major focus for hospitals, and much of that focus also extends to EMS.

Moreover, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) considers those hospital-acquired infections as 'never events,' thus placing the entire financial burden of the care of those patients upon the hospital. In one study of catheter-related bloodstream infections, hospital stays increased from 10 to 20 days, at an additional cost ranging from $4,000 to $56,000 per patient. This trend is likely to continue due to the aging of the American population and the consequential decline in immune system efficiency, and the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. hospitals, with a price tag of over $20 billion in 2011.īetween 20, sepsis hospitalizations in the U.S. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality lists sepsis as the most expensive condition treated in U.S. has a mortality rate ranging from 28-50 percent, and even though it occurs in only 10 percent of hospitalized patients, it is linked to at least half of all in-hospital deaths.

End tidal capnography