The challenge of early identification of the hospital patient at risk of septic complications

It is evident that the patient with sepsis needs immediate attention to allow rapid and effective intervention. Recently, the Sepsis-3 Definitions task force used multivariable logistic regression to develop the qSOFA—a short sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) score that incorporates a systolic blood pressure of 100 mmHg or less, a respiratory rate of 22/min or greater and/or an acute alteration in mentation—to be used as a means of identifying infected patients on the general ward who may need urgent attention and further workup for possible sepsis (1,2).