Sepsis claims thousands of lives in Canada and nearly 50 million globally each year, says Dr. Claudia dos Santos, senior author of a study published in Nature Communications. As a critical care physician and clinician-scientist at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, she emphasizes that early treatment is vital: “A one-hour delay in treating sepsis can raise mortality by nearly 8%.”

Currently, there's no single test to determine which patients with infections—from COVID-19 to minor cuts—will develop sepsis, largely due to its vague and overlapping symptoms like fever, confusion, or low blood pressure. Diagnosis relies on clinical judgment, often without a definitive biological marker.

Motivated to improve this, dos Santos and a team from the University of British Columbia (UBC) and the National Research Council Canada developed a blood test that may predict sepsis before symptoms fully manifest. Led by UBC’s Dr. Robert Hancock, the team used AI to identify a set of six genes—dubbed "Sepset"—that are more active in patients who eventually developed sepsis.

In an analysis of 586 previous patients, the team found that increased expression of these genes signaled the onset of sepsis within 24 hours. Acting on this early signal could enable doctors to begin life-saving treatments like antibiotics, fluids, and ICU preparation much sooner.

To make the test more accessible, researchers created a portable device called Powerblade, which uses just a drop of blood and provides results in under three hours. In tests with stored patient samples, it was 92% accurate in identifying sepsis.

While promising, the test has yet to be used in real-time clinical settings. A clinical trial, supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, is planned to evaluate its real-world effectiveness. “Our next step is to test the device in actual patient care and see if it improves outcomes,” said dos Santos.

Rource: https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/canadian-researchers-develop-test-they-say-can-help-diagnose-life-threatening-sepsis/