New hope for treating sepsis

DEADLY sepsis is poorly treated because there are actually four hidden sub-types of the condition, researchers claim.

Doctors say the current ‘one size fits all’ approach to treatment means sepsis, which kills 52,000 people in the UK each year, is often mismanaged.

In a study of more than 60,000 patients, a team from Pittsburgh University found that patients with sepsis were clustered into four distinct types.

The findings could explain why several recent trials of treatments for sepsis – an immune response in which the body attacks its own organs – have failed.

Study author Professor Derek Angus told JAMA medical journal: ‘The next step is to find therapies that apply to the specific types of sepsis and then design clinical trials to test them.’