Hospitals improving sepsis treatment

The figures show 28 per cent of patients that needed antibiotics for sepsis were not getting them within an hour.

However health bosses have said the figures relate to a period up to March this year, and great improvements have been made regarding sepsis in the past six months.

Sepsis is a rare but serious complication of an infection. Without prompt treatment, it can lead to multiple organ failure and death.

Dr Edwin Borman, medical director at The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH), said: “At SaTH, we have been working to improve care for patients who suffer sepsis by using techniques learned from the Virginia Mason Institute (VMI) in Seattle.

“Many NHS organisations have challenges managing sepsis, but we identified that it was important to address them within our trust.

"Firstly, raising the profile of sepsis to improve awareness has always been a significant factor. The UK Sepsis Trust and others have been doing great work in this area, but we knew there was more we could be doing in SaTH.

“Since then, we have been developing a number of improvements on some of our wards which have led to encouraging improvements, exceeding initial expectations.

"We have made changes to all elements of the sepsis pathway, including reducing the time taken to deliver the sepsis bundle from five hours to under 30 minutes."

He added: “There have also been important reductions in the time taken to recognise and confirm sepsis, giving people the best chance of fast treatment. This includes a 60 per cent reduction in the time taken to obtain initial diagnosis and a reduction in the time it takes to turnaround the blood sample. Once diagnosis has been confirmed, treatment is also much quicker now, with the average time for delivery of antibiotics now 83 per cent faster than before the improvements were made.

“We will now be looking to roll out the learning from these wards to other wards in our hospitals.

“We will be welcoming Dr Ron Daniels of the UK Sepsis Trust back to SaTH later this month for a shared learning event not only for our consultants and nurses, but also for colleagues from Community Health and GPs to promote the importance of recognising and treating Sepsis. We look forward to discussing with Dr Daniels our progress in this area and learn ideas on how we can further improve.”