L. G. Thijs

TL;DR: The ESICM developed a so-called sepsis-related organ failure assessment (SOFA) score to describe quantitatively and as objectively as possible the degree of organ dysfunction/failure over time in groups of patients or even in individual patients.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors evaluated the performance of total maximum sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) score and a derived measure, delta SOFA (total maximum SOFA score minus admission total SOFA) as a descriptor of multiple organ dysfunction/failure in intensive care.

TL;DR: A meta-analysis comprising this and two other double-blind, placebo-controlled trials with AT III with a total of 122 patients suffering from severe sepsis confirms the positive trend and points to the fact that a sufficiently powered phase III trial is warranted to prove whether AT III has a beneficial role in the treatment of severe Sepsis.

TL;DR: Significant differences associated with religious affiliation and culture were observed for the type of end-of-life decision, the times to therapy limitation and death, and discussion of decisions with patient families.

TL;DR: At present, the severity scores have a very limited or no role in clinical decision-making for an individual patient, because they are based on a number of physiological and disease-oriented variables collected during the first 24 h after ICU admission.