Blood purification in sepsis

Excerpt

The mortality of patients with severe sepsis and septic shock remains unacceptably high. Thus, there is an urgent clinical need for novel therapeutic approaches to improve the prognosis of these patients. At present, apart from antibiotic therapy and infectious source control, the mainstay of therapy is symptomatic. However, research has led to a better understanding of the pathophysiology of sepsis, in which the activation of multiple pro- and anti-inflammatory mediators plays a key role [1]. Whilst animal models of sepsis have provided encouraging results with strategies aiming at modulation of these pathways, clinical studies in patients using targeted pharmacological approaches have so far proved disappointing. …