Be careful, it's sepsis, high fever that doesn't subside, mental fatigue, and skin bruises

September 13th every year is World Sepsis Day. So, do you know what sepsis is? Why is it said that sepsis is "vicious" and can take people's lives? What are the symptoms of sepsis? How should we take preventive measures?

Watching 2-year-old Tian Tian's condition improve and his spirit recover significantly, Tian Tian's mother finally let go of her worries. She never expected that the child would develop sepsis due to a persistent high fever, almost dying.

Sepsis is a life-threatening organ dysfunction caused by an imbalance in the patient's body's response to infection. Sepsis is mostly caused by infection. In the past, the source of infection was more focused on bacteria, but clinical evidence shows that in recent years, the number of sepsis caused by viruses has also been increasing. The daily sepsis of children is a typical case of viral infection.

Cao Qing, Director of the Infectious Diseases Department at Shanghai Children's Medical Center, introduced that after admission every day, it was found that the lung infection was caused by respiratory "pneumovirus" combined with "rhinovirus/enterovirus" infection. At the same time, PCT, cytokines and other indicators were significantly increased, skin ecchymosis, and thrombocytopenia. This indicates that the child is suffering from viral sepsis caused by viral infection.

The reporter learned that there are certain high-risk groups for sepsis: children under 1-2 years old, elderly over 65 years old, people with low immunity, cancer chemotherapy patients and people with basic diseases such as diabetes. For this group of people, if they experience recurrent high fever, poor mental state, increased breathing and heartbeat, pale complexion, skin ecchymosis or reduced urine volume after infection, they all need to be highly concerned. At the same time, as its symptoms are also high fever, it should be correctly identified from general influenza high fever to avoid misdiagnosis and missed diagnosis.

"Many parents believe that respiratory virus infections can generally heal on their own, so if a child's high fever does not subside, parents may not always seek medical attention in a timely manner. If the child still has a recurrent high fever after 3-5 days of respiratory infection and uses antipyretic drugs to treat the high fever, they must go to the hospital for timely treatment. At the same time, if the child shows accompanying symptoms such as chills, skin ecchymosis, gastrointestinal discomfort, and mental changes, they need to be careful of viral infections and take the child to the hospital for treatment in a timely manner." Cao Qing said.

The annual World Sepsis Day advocates scientific prevention and control, which is urgent. Due to the high mortality rate of severe sepsis, 20 to 30 million patients worldwide suffer from sepsis every year. The treatment of sepsis emphasizes timely treatment, with correct diagnosis and treatment within 1 hour of infection, and a patient survival rate of over 80%; After 6 hours of infection, the diagnosis and treatment survival rate decreased to 30%. Meanwhile, due to the low level of understanding of sepsis, not all patients can receive correct diagnosis and treatment, and the mortality rate of hospitalized patients can reach 30% to 60%. Timely treatment can reduce the risk of death by half, and the cost of early sepsis treatment is lower, significantly saving patients time in hospitalization and critical care.

Cao Qing stated that there are some preventive measures to reduce the occurrence of sepsis, especially for immunocompromised individuals who need attention. The best way to prevent sepsis is first and foremost to prevent infection, which can be achieved through the following methods: first, timely vaccination. Timely influenza vaccination for young children, the elderly, and those with underlying diseases during the annual influenza season can effectively reduce the occurrence of influenza, especially severe influenza, and have a positive preventive effect on subsequent sepsis; Secondly, it is important to maintain good lifestyle habits, wash hands frequently, consume clean water and food, and strengthen awareness of sepsis.

Text: Li Li

Photography: Min Di

text