“I can think of two answers why a focus on medical surgery units is especially important – The population of patients who develop sepsis while on a medical surgery floor is a relatively small population when you look at all sepsis within a hospital, but that population has a much higher risk of not surviving during their hospitalization – their mortality rate is higher, so it’s a critical group to recognize and treat,” relayed hospitalist, Evan Coates, MD. Also, it is not uncommon for seemingly healthier patients to get triaged to medical surgical units where their sepsis progresses unrecognized into severe sepsis or septic shock. Medical surgical units are left out of most sepsis training and implementation plans, however, data shows these patients are at the greatest risk of sepsis advancing once present.
To address the issue further, Virginia Mason introduced the Sepsis Power Hour within the medical surgery department. Expanding implementation to overlooked medical units Calls to the Rapid Response Team at Virginia Mason have declined by 66 percent from 120 calls per month to 40. The average cost of treating a 90-day episode of sepsis at Virginia Mason is 21.5 percent less than the national average, and discharges to long-term care facilities has been reduced by 15 percent. The high success rate of implementing the bundle on-time at Virginia Mason, in less than one hour, has led to lower pharmacy costs associated with sepsis treatments, reduced the number of days patients spend in the hospital, and decreased mortality rates due to sepsis. The outcomes of implementing this protocol at Virginia Mason have proven to greatly reduce the costs associated with the treatment of sepsis, as well as, dramatically improve patient outcomes. “The best thing about Sepsis Power Hour is that it brings care to the patient without the patient having to wait it really leverages the whole multidisciplinary team exactly where their skills and strengths are, and the ultimate beneficiary is the patient.” – Alice FergusonĪccording to nurse project manager, Alice Ferguson, “The best thing about Sepsis Power Hour is that it brings care to the patient without the patient having to wait it really leverages the whole multidisciplinary team exactly where their skills and strengths are, and the ultimate beneficiary is the patient.”