Chul Park, Nam Su Ku, Dae Won Park, Joo Hyun Park, Tae Sun Ha, Do Wan Kim, So Young Park, Youjin Chang, Kwang Wook Jo, Moon Seong Baek, Yijun Seo, Tae Gun Shin, Gina Yu, Jongmin Lee, Yong Jun Choi, Ji Young Jang, Yun Tae Jung, Inseok Jeong, Hwa Jin Cho, Ala Woo, Sua Kim, Dae-Hwan Bae, Sung Wook Kang, Sun Hyo Park, Gee Young Suh, Sunghoon Park
Acute Crit Care. 2024;39(4):445-472. Published online November 18, 2024
Background Despite recent advances and global improvements in sepsis recognition and supportive care, mortality rates remain high, and adherence to sepsis bundle components in Korea is low. To address this, the Korean Sepsis Alliance, affiliated with the Korean Society of Critical Care Medicine, developed the first sepsis treatment guidelines for Korea based on a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis.
Methods A de novo method was used to develop the guidelines. Methodologies included determining key questions, conducting a literature search and selection, assessing the risk of bias, synthesizing evidence, and developing recommendations. The certainty of evidence and the strength of recommendations were determined using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations approach. Draft recommendations underwent internal and external review processes and public hearings. The development of these guidelines was supported by a research grant from the Korean Disease Control and Prevention Agency.
Results In these guidelines, we focused on early treatments for adult patients with sepsis and septic shock. Through the guideline development process, 12 key questions and their respective recommendations were formulated. These include lactate measurement, fluid therapies, target blood pressure, antibiotic administration, use of vasopressors and dobutamine, extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, and echocardiography.
Conclusions These guidelines aim to support medical professionals in making appropriate decisions about treating adult sepsis and septic shock. We hope these guidelines will increase awareness of sepsis and reduce its mortality rate.
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Methods We performed a retrospective study of adult patients with septic shock in the ED of a single tertiary medical center. Serial lactate levels were measured five times within 12 hours. We also compared the initial lactate level, maximum lactate level, and lactate area score. The lactate area score was defined as the sum of the area under the curve measured at 2, 4, 6, and 12 hours following the initial measurement.
Results A total of 362 patients were enrolled in this study, and the overall 28-day mortality was 31.8%. The lactate area score of serial lactate levels as well as the initial (median [interquartile range], 4.9 [3.4 to 10.5]; P=0.003) and maximum (7.3 [4.2 to 13.2]; P<0.001) lactate levels were significantly higher in the non-survivor group. However, in multivariate analysis, only the lactate area score (odds ratio, 1.013; 95% confidence interval, 1.007 to 1.019) was significantly associated with 28-day mortality.
Conclusions The early lactate area score may be a possible prognostic marker for predicting the 28-day mortality of adult septic shock patients. Further prospective interventional studies should be conducted to validate our results.
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