Why knowing about sepsis could save your life

At Beebe Healthcare, physicians, nurses and staff all work together to create policies and procedures to prevent and treat sepsis.

Ongoing education is important to a knowledgeable staff, and it allows us to intuitively create work groups and new policies and procedures, and improve the care we provide to everyone who walks through the doors.

Over the years, sepsis guidelines provided by healthcare organizations have changed.

As we learn more, the procedures change. As we try out new policies, we tweak them and make improvements.

Beebe has a Sepsis Workgroup that is dedicated to improving our numbers and outcomes when it comes to diagnosing and treating sepsis.

Beebe utilizes advanced technology by designing the patient’s Electronic Health Record to send automated alerts to notify healthcare providers that a patient may be septic.

This can assist in early implementation of the sepsis care guidelines.

Beebe also has members of its experienced Early Nursing Intervention Team, aka ENIT Nurses, responding to the patient’s bedside to collaborate with the patient’s primary nurses and physicians to work through the treatment plan for the patient who has been identified as potentially having sepsis.

There is an interdisciplinary team that includes doctors, nurses, quality analysts, pharmacists, and information technology personnel that meets regularly to review sepsis care and develops protocols to improve management of septic patients.

We have developed nurse-driven protocols that enable the nurses to initiate the septic patient care guidelines, and physicians complete training courses that describe how Beebe uses best practice protocols in the treatment of sepsis.

What is sepsis? 

Sepsis is the body’s way of reacting to an infection. When the infection becomes severe, your body can go into shock. Sepsis is a medical emergency and it can be deadly.

Often, patients have a cut or wound through which an infection enters the body. The harmful toxins or bacteria get into the blood. This can lead to organ failure and death.

How is sepsis diagnosed? 

Unfortunately for medical providers, there is no key sign that a patient has sepsis, but there are indicators that can point to sepsis.

They include: 

• Shivering or fever, a feeling of being very cold 

• Extreme pain or discomfort, sometimes characterized as “the worst ever” 

• Pale or discolored skin 

• Sleepiness, difficult to rouse, or a feeling of confusion 

• Shortness of breath 

• Multiple symptoms that might be characterized as “I feel like I might die.”

When a patient enters the emergency room, our medical teams assess them for all of these signs.

If you have ever been to an emergency room, you know there are a lot of questions asked.

The sepsis questions are likely in that list.

How is sepsis treated? 

The most important part of diagnosing and treating sepsis is to move quickly.

As soon as sepsis is suspected, our medical team swings into action. There are many blood tests that must be completed within a certain time frame.

There are also antibiotic medications that must be given at certain times. We follow a very strict protocol when it comes to sepsis to help the patient regain his or her health.

This protocol includes blood tests, urine tests, inspection of wounds, respiratory tests and imaging scans. Early, aggressive treatment of sepsis is the best way to have a positive outcome.

Who is at risk for sepsis? 

Anyone can develop sepsis, but it is most common among older adults and those who have weakened immune systems due to illness or injury. Those who have had pneumonia, an abdominal infection, kidney infection or bloodstream infection are more at risk.

If you develop an infection or if you develop symptoms of sepsis after an injury, surgery or hospitalization, seek emergency medical treatment immediately.