Mechanisms of sepsis and insights from clinical trials

Multiple clinical trials of adjunctive therapy for sepsis and septic shock have been conducted to neutralize bacterial components or to modulate host inflammatory responses to infection but with limited success. Many therapies are beneficial only in patients with a high severity of illness and have minimal or harmful effects in patients that are less severely ill. Improved measures of severity of illness and discovery of biomarkers to help identify these high-risk patients are needed.

Section editor:Clay Braden Marsh – Department of Internal Medicine, Ohio State University, USA