Exploring sepsis from definitions to prediction

Diagnosing sepsis and determining its severity in emergency departments remains difficult. This thesis evaluates current clinical criteria, showing that when three different sepsis definitions were applied to the same emergency patients, each selected an almost entirely distinct group. Additionally, widely used severity scores developed for intensive care units perform inconsistently in emergency care, ignoring the prognostic impact of the infection site and bacterial type.

The research also identifies existing hospital data that could improve risk assessment. Indicators such as the time required for bacteria to grow in blood samples and automated immune cell measurements from routine blood analysers can help flag vulnerable patients before conventional test results return.