Nottingham University Hospitals first Trust in the UK to roll out automated sepsis screening to children | Latest news

Nottingham University Hospitals first Trust in the UK to roll out automated sepsis screening to children

Nottingham Children’s Hospital is the first children’s service in the UK to have electronic sepsis screening of its patients using the most recent NICE guidelines.

Sepsis occurs when the body’s response to an infection becomes out of control, which can have devastating effects on the main organs of the body. According to the UK Sepsis Trust, sepsis is estimated to be responsible for over 44,000 deaths in the UK per year.

Nottingham University Hospitals has been automatically screening all adult patients for sepsis for 12 months. This service was then extended to the Nottingham Children’s Hospital at the end of February 2018.

Evidence over the last decade suggests that there is a strong association between prompt administration of antibiotics and improved survival in sick patients with sepsis. Having this system in place allows NUH to ensure early identification, prompt medical assessment and rapid delivery of treatment.

Sally Wood, Sepsis Lead Nurse, who along with Dr Mark Simmonds was involved in the adult screening design explained: "The screening system immediately scans the patient observations as they are taken and then recorded into NUH's Nervecentre system against age specific criteria for sepsis in children.

"All patients who meet criteria which suggest they may have sepsis are automatically indicated to the appropriate staff. If the further assessment suggests sepsis, patients are then escalated to the appropriate members of the medical team to start rapid treatment.” 

Steph McHale, Paediatric CCOT Lead Nurse said: “It has been a fantastic achievement to ensure that we have a robust screening process in place for the complex and varied groups of patients that we see in the Children’s Hospital. We look forward to further analysis of the impact of this extended screening in due course.”

During March over 165,000 observations were automatically screened for High Risk Sepsis for patients aged 0-110 years.

Recent analysis shows that this innovative use of electronic screening for sepsis across NUH, has improved our ability to deliver antibiotics within the recommended time frame and has also reduced the variation of sepsis treatment for our patients. Around 90% of patients with sepsis have received intravenous antibiotics within an hour during the last year.

 

S. Wood (Sepsis Lead Nurse), S. McHale (CCOT Lead Nurse), N. Taylor (CCOT Lead Nurse), A. Ford (Sepsis Improvement Nurse), Dr C Silvestre (Consultant Sepsis Lead for Paediatrics), Dr L Ashmore (Consultant Paediatrician Acute Medicine), Dr M Simmonds (previous Consultant Sepsis Lead), Dr M Chikhani (current Consultant Sepsis lead), with acknowledgement to the wider members of the Sepsis Action Group at NUH.

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