A NEW test can help doctors predict if a patient will develop the deadly condition sepsis within an hour of them arriving at hospital, instead of one to two days.
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Sepsis is caused by an immune response triggered by an infection commonly caused by bacteria, but also by fungi, viruses or parasites.
There are 18 million cases of sepsis worldwide every year, with up to five million deaths.
Common signs and symptoms include fever, increased heart rate, increased breathing rate and confusion.
Risk factors include young or old age, a weakened immune system from conditions such as cancer or diabetes, and major trauma or burns.
The test has been developed by researchers at the University of British Columbia in Canada.
"We identified a gene signature that is associated with eventual diagnosis of sepsis and subsequent organ failure," said Professor Bob Hancock, of the university's Department of Microbiology and Immunology who co-authored a report with hospital physician John Boyd, an assistant professor at UBC.
The report was published in the journal EBioMedicine.
"We can test for this genetic signature as soon as the patient arrives in the emergency ward."
A typical diagnosis can take 24 to 48 hours. The new test takes as little as one hour and identifies 96 per cent of patients who were at the very early stages of sepsis.
"With sepsis every hour counts," Dr Hancock said. "The treatment involves aggressive antibiotics but the most potent drugs can't be administered until a diagnosis is confirmed because of the risk of antibiotic-resistant bacteria."
The findings also revealed a potential misunderstanding about the disease. Until now sepsis has been treated as an inflammatory disease but more than 30 clinical trials of anti-inflammatory drugs for sepsis have failed.
The gene signature identified by Dr Hancock and his colleagues relates to a special kind of immune suppression called cellular reprogramming and suggests that treating inflammation in sepsis is a bad idea.
