Identification of Sepsis among Ward Patients

Sepsis is a systemic response to infection, which may progress to severe sepsis and septic shock (1). It is a global health problem that carries a huge economic burden (2, 3). The last decade has seen a significant drive to improve outcomes for patients with sepsis, with substantial effort focused on intensive care unit (ICU) and emergency department (ED) patients in particular. Recent data have indicated that ward patients who develop sepsis have worse outcomes than ICU or ED patients (4, 5), which has led to efforts to improve sepsis recognition in the ward environment to enable prompt intervention.