What is sepsis? Sepsis is a complication caused by the body's overwhelming and life-threatening response to an infection, which can lead to tissue damage, organ failure, and death.
You might continue to have physical and emotional symptoms. These can last for months, or even years, after you had sepsis. These long-term effects are sometimes called post-sepsis syndrome, and can include: feeling very tired and weak, and difficulty sleeping.
Most people with severe sepsis must be treated in an intensive care unit (ICU), where they will receive fluids and antibiotics, and treatment to try to reverse organ damage and to prevent further damage.
The organs more frequently affected are kidneys, liver, lungs, heart, central nervous system, and hematologic system. This multiple organ failure is the hallmark of sepsis and determines patients' course from infection to recovery or death.
Many people who survive severe sepsis recover completely, and their lives return to normal. But some people, especially those with pre-existing chronic diseases, may have permanent organ damage.
As severe sepsis usually involves infection of the bloodstream, the heart is one of the first affected organs.
They concluded that septic patients have a high mortality rate after two years of hospital discharge compared to patients recovered from other diseases; the percentage of death ranged from 22% to 70%.
Long term effects of sepsis
Symptoms of post-sepsis syndrome include: feeling lethargic or excessively tired.
Life after sepsis
Many of the participants experienced a depersonalization, almost like they had become a different person in some situations, which had a negative impact on both family and other social relations. The change was due to the need for rest and tranquility.
Disabling muscle and joint pains. Decreased mental (cognitive) function. Loss of self-esteem and self-belief. Organ dysfunction (kidney failure, lung problems, etc.)
Septic shock is the most severe level and is diagnosed when your blood pressure drops to dangerous levels.
Complications. As sepsis worsens, blood flow to vital organs, such as your brain, heart and kidneys, becomes impaired. Sepsis may cause abnormal blood clotting that results in small clots or burst blood vessels that damage or destroy tissues.
These sepsis survivors suffer from additional morbidities such as higher risk of readmissions, cardiovascular disease, cognitive impairment and of death, for years following index sepsis episode.
Patients with sepsis accounted for 45% of ICU bed days and 33% of hospital bed days. The ICU length of stay (LOS) was between 4 and 8 days and the median hospital LOS was 18 days.
An estimated 27% of people with sepsis in hospitals and 42% of people in intensive care units will die.
During sepsis, systemic hypotension, disturbed perfusion of the microcirculation, and direct tissue-toxicity caused by inflammatory immune reaction can occur and contribute to organ failure.
Organ failure symptoms include low grade fever, tachycardia, and tachypnea in the first 24 hours. Within the following 24-72 hours, lung failure may set in. This can be followed by bacteremia, as well as renal, intestinal, and liver failure.
According to an epidemiological study, sepsis affects about 700,000 people annually in the United States alone, with an overall mortality rate of 30%, or more than 50% in patients with septic shock and/or multiple system organ failure.
About 70% to 90% of hospitalized patients with AKI experience recovery of kidney function within 3 to 4 days of AKI onset. In several studies, complete and sustained reversal of AKI within 48 to 72 hours was associated with better outcomes than was AKI of longer duration.
Children can also live with lasting issues related to sepsis. About 34% of pediatric sepsis survivors are not back to pre-sepsis functioning for at least 28 days after their hospitalization. The numbers could actually be higher as another study that included teachers who evaluated students who had had sepsis.
Sepsis clearly alters the innate and adaptive immune responses for sustained periods of time after clinical recovery, with immune suppression, chronic inflammation, and persistence of bacterial representing such alterations.
Recurrent sepsis is a common cause of hospital readmission after sepsis. Our study demonstrates that, while two-thirds of recurrent sepsis hospitalizations had the same site of infection, just one fifth were confirmed to be the same site and same organism as the initial sepsis hospitalization.
Without rapid antibiotic treatment, it is possible for the person to go into septic shock and suffer from multiple organ failure, resulting in lifelong disability or even death. Clinicians are very concerned that patients with sepsis through infection with antibiotic-resistant bacteria may not respond to treatment.