Sepsis Awareness events are being held around the world throughout the month of September to educate about the incidence, severity and steps toward saving more lives. September 13, 2015, is being declared World Sepsis Day. This one day brings together health care professionals and members of the public to recognize sepsis as global problem.
World Sepsis Day enhanced the Surviving Sepsis Campaign’s (SSC), commitment to reduce severe sepsis mortality by 25 percent worldwide. The SSC included several phases, Phase I public awareness, Phase II guideline development and education along with Phase III a performance improvement initiative. Cooper’s R. Phillip Dellinger, MD, Chief of the Department of Medicine, is one of the founders of the SSC and was instrumental in developing the first set of guidelines in 2004, leading the revisions in both 2008 and 2012. The SSC guidelines led to development of the sepsis bundles, with the purpose of improving patient outcomes. The sepsis process measure bundles include a group of time sensitive interventions that reflect the guidelines which can be easily measured. The current three- and six-hour bundles include a total of seven process measures.
Building on the SSC Phase III performance improvement program’s success focusing on the emergency department and ICUs, a SSC Phase IV initiative was developed. Attention in Phase IV was placed on medical/surgical/telemetry floors with a primary goal to promote early recognition of severe sepsis through daily nurse screening.
Although much work has been done to improve outcomes from severe sepsis, mortality continues to be unacceptably high and is the most expensive in-hospital condition to treat in the United States. These factors contributed to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and The Joint Commission to publish a uniform set of National Hospital Quality measures to address severe sepsis care in the U.S. The primary objective is to promote and enhance the utility of the three- and six-hour severe sepsis bundles for all hospitals. Starting October 1, 2015, Early Management of Severe Sepsis (SEP-1) will be measured and reported. The SEP-1 measure aims to refine and standardize hospital care to improve patient outcomes.
Cooper University Hospital has been leading the way in sepsis awareness on a national and international level for many years. Along with our colleagues around the globe, we celebrate September as Sepsis Month, working together to improve patient outcomes from sepsis.
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