Diagnosis of Sepsis: How Does a Good Laboratory Respond?

Sepsis and septic shock can prove fatal if not diagnosed and appropriately managed. A peep into adoption of certain novel lab techniques for early and accurate diagnosis of sepsis is the main objective of this review. A semi-automated blood culture system such as BacT-alert is advantageous as it is a continuous monitoring system. Rapid methods for identification like immunological methods (latex agglutination, immunochromatography methods), use of chromogenic agar media, and molecular methods were evaluated. Detection assays for biomarkers of sepsis (C-reactive protein [CRP], procalitonin and bacterial endotoxins) were also analyzed. The turn-around time for detection of sepsis was significantly reduced from about 48 hours as seen in the conventional methods to as little as an hour as observed in the above described methods. The microbiology lab plays a pivotal role by making use of these described techniques and hence guiding towards accurate diagnosis and management of sepsis.