Sepsis is an urgent medical condition that is extremely dangerous and warrants an immediate trip to the emergency room. That’s why it’s important to recognize the symptoms and understand if you are at risk.
What Is Sepsis?
Sepsis is your body’s extreme reaction to an infection. It is not a disease on its own. Instead, it’s a series of changes within your body due to a bacteria, fungus, parasite or virus. Sepsis can cause your blood pressure to fall to dangerously low levels. It can set off an inflammatory reaction that harms organs such as your kidneys or lungs. And those circumstances can cause you to get very sick — rapidly. Sepsis is a true emergency.
If you have sepsis and don’t get treatment quickly, your organs could shut down.
Sepsis, or septicemia, is sometimes referred to by other terms, including:
- Blood poisoning. This name is inaccurate, but it is commonly used, especially by older Americans.
- Systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS). A term used less often.
- Toxemia and bacteremia involve toxins spreading through your bloodstream. They can lead to sepsis.
- Septic shock. Septic shock is the most severe form of sepsis. It can happen if your sepsis isn’t treated quickly. During septic shock, your body shuts down, organ by organ. The mortality rate for people with septic shock is high.
- Cellulitis can occur along with sepsis. If soft tissue beneath your skin swells up, hardens, hurts and feels warm to the touch, it might be cellulitis, which is an acute bacterial infection. It’s most likely to happen on a leg or foot. You might even get a fever, or the skin might blister. Cellulitis is an infection that can spread and cause harm to more of your body.
Sepsis Symptoms
Since sepsis isn’t a condition with a solid set of symptoms, you should keep a lookout for the most common clues if you or a loved one is in a high-risk category. That is especially true for the parents of children 5 and under — who account for half of all sepsis cases around the world, as well as for the elderly, and for people who are immunocompromised. For example, if you have cancer, AIDS or severe COVID infection, or are undergoing chemotherapy, your chances of developing sepsis are higher than average. The danger is also elevated if you’ve been in a healthcare facility for a length of time. About 15 of every 1,000 hospital patients globally develop sepsis.
Especially if you’re at higher risk than most people, be aware of symptoms that might indicate you have sepsis. You might have clammy skin, feel dizzy or experience extreme fatigue, for starters. You might even pass out. While symptoms vary, the Sepsis Alliance uses the TIME method to spell out a range of symptoms:
- Temperature — If you’re running a fever and/or shivering, that could be a sign of infection. If your temperature is lower than normal, that’s called hypothermia, and that’s a clue, too, that you could have sepsis.
- Infection — Infections don’t always have symptoms, but some do. Pay attention if your urination pattern changes, it hurts to urinate, you struggle to breathe or your skin looks different, especially around a cut. Those are all clues.
- Mental decline — If you become disoriented, can’t think straight or feel fatigued, that can indicate sepsis.
- Extremely ill — Whatever your symptoms, if you feel extraordinarily rotten, head to the ER just in case to have experts take a look.
If there’s even a small chance you have sepsis, call 911 or rush to an emergency room. There, trained professionals know how to proceed. Skip the doctors you’d normally visit with a problem. For example, if your kidneys are acting odd, do not go to a nephrologist. If your lungs are behaving oddly, skip the pulmonologist. Start with the ER, where you can be seen and treated immediately if necessary.
How Sepsis Is Treated
It takes time to diagnose sepsis, so ER medical teams in the United States will often start treatment before blood test results come in. They can’t afford the luxury of waiting. If they suspect you even might have sepsis, they’ll take quick action just in case.
- Antibiotics. The ER staff will likely put you on broad-spectrum antibiotics, or possibly another type of antimicrobial, while they take and wait for blood test results that might provide more detail. Your sepsis might not be caused by a bacterial infection, but it probably will be and if so antibiotics are likely to help. Once the results arrive, the doctors might know if your infection is in your lungs, kidneys, urinary tract or soft tissue.
- Fluids. Expect to get an IV of hydrating fluids. If you have sepsis, your blood pressure might plummet, which affects hydration. Fluids will help raise your blood pressure back to normal levels.
- Medications. Rather than let you lose fluids yet again, the ER team will give you medications that will help your body stay hydrated and/or increase your blood pressure.
ER teams are well-versed in the severity of sepsis, how to recognize it and how to treat it early. While experts debate the reliability of statistics, it is said that up to 30 percent of people with sepsis die worldwide. That number is lower in the United States, although at least a fifth of people in the U.S. who go into septic shock have their organs shut down, and there is a high mortality rate. In Florida, 8.5 percent of people diagnosed with sepsis die from it. Nationally, people 65 and older have 13 times more of a chance of being hospitalized with sepsis than others, and only a little over half of them ultimately go home, not into long-term care, assuming they survive. Nonhispanic black older adults have the highest death rate from sepsis.
So don’t fool around. If you, or someone you’re with, shows signs that could possibly be sepsis, head to the emergency room and let the medical experts assess and, if necessary, treat the patient. Earliest is best.
