Rakesh Engineer, MD, FACEP, said: Patients presenting to the Emergency Department with sepsis syndromes have a very high mortality, from 25-45%. Early, aggressive diagnosis and initiation of therapy has been shown to markedly reduce mortality. Our data suggest that patients presenting with concern for infection may quickly and accurately be assessed for the presence of sepsis using BIOREACTANCE noninvasive hemodynamic monitoring and an orthostatic protocol.”
Michael Pinsky, M.D., comments about the results: “It is always difficult to determine which patients presenting to an ED are more likely to rapidly deteriorate, and which will recover quickly. The risk of under-resuscitation of the unstable patient is increased mortality, morbidity and cost, while the risk of aggressive instrumentation and treatment in the stable patient is increased complications of the (invasive) procedures which are known to increase morbidity and cost. The study by Engineer et al. used a simple hydrostatic challenge to clearly identify which patients were in “compensated shock” and thus needed aggressive resuscitation. The relevance of this study is that it is the first to show, in an ED population, that the use of a rapid and noninvasive monitoring device can accurately identify occult cardiovascular instability. The clinical implications of these findings are potentially far-reaching.”
