Identify sepsis in patients by using early warning scores, doctors are urged

General practitioners and hospital doctors should all use an early warning score system when they suspect that a patient may have sepsis to help improve the recognition of cases, a report recommends.1

Nearly half (45%) of patients with sepsis admitted to hospital with no other obvious problem either died or were left with a disability, an audit of cases in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland has found.

A third (34%; 184) of the 544 hospitals reviewed had no formal sepsis protocol to identify and manage patients with sepsis, and this needs to be rectified, said a report into sepsis …