Look for Organ Dysfunction to Identify Septic Patients

There'll be confusion about how to identify septic patients...due to new Sepsis-3 criteria from the Society of Critical Care Medicine.

For years, we've identified sepsis as suspected infection plus at least two systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) criteria...temperature > 101°F or < 96.8°F, heart rate > 90, white blood cell count > 12,000/mm³ or < 4000/mm³, etc.

But SIRS criteria don't correlate well with poor outcomes.