Sepsis

Hemofiltration: Nonspecifically removes waste products. One major downside is that it also removes inflammatory cytokines that fight infection.

Xigris: This recombinant drug therapy is used to prevent clotting and modulate the inflammatory response. However, treatment can cause severe bleeding and deplete inflammatory mediators necessary for fighting infection.

Antibiotics: Simply reducing pathogen load with use of targeted antibiotics has proven to be somewhat effective, however, dose is limited due to toxicity.

Whole Body Blood Transfusions: This radical treatment has been used to save infants with sepsis but also removes infection fighting components in the blood.

Current Treatments

Sepsis is the body’s response to a systematic microbial infection, typically resulting in an inflammatory process marked by an elevated heart rate, rapid breathing, and raised body temperature. Sepsis results from an exaggerated inflammatory response that spreads beyond the original location of infection to the whole-body via the bloodstream. The result is the formation of blood-clots that hinders oxygen and nutrients from reaching vital organs thereby leading to death. Those at particular risk include newborns, the elderly and immuno-compromised individuals. According to the Mayo Clinic, approximately 200,000 patients die annually from severe sepsis.