Sepsis

Sepsis is a serious medical condition characterized by a whole-body inflammatory state (called a systemic inflammatory response syndrome or SIRS) caused by infection.The body may develop this inflammatory response to microbes in the blood. The related layman's term is blood poisoning.Symptoms related to the provoking infection, sepsis is characterized by evidence of acute inflammation present throughout the entire body, and is therefore frequently associated with fever and elevated white blood cell count (leukocytosis)or low white blood cell count and lower than average temperature. The modern concept of sepsis is that the host's immune response to the infection causes most of the symptoms of sepsis, resulting in hemodynamic consequences and damage to organs. This host response has been termed systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) and is characterized by hemodynamic compromise and resultant metabolic derangement.




When a microbe infects a tissue, the cascades of pro-inflammatory mediators are released, but these are counterbalanced by the release of anti-inflammatory agents. This balance enables mobilization of defense and microbe killing mediators, while allowing tissue repair and healing. In sepsis this equilibrium in perturbed, and pro inflammatory mediators and dominate to illustrate endothelial damage. Studies at the extent of coagulation and fibrinosios abnormalities in sepsis have shown that endothelial damage promotes coagulation normally modulators promote fibrinosios to contract thrombosis. In sepsis however they endothelial damage is proposed to suppress fibrinolysis, further contributing to the loss of control .As the body tries to return to a normal state endogenous modulators of homeostasis are consumed and their levels become low .In parallel to endothelial damage promotes further inflammation. Left unopposed the endothelial damage accumulates and coagulation. This cycle of uncontrolled inflammation and coagulation deals with the progression of sepsis resulting hypoxia and ischemia organ dysfunction and ultimately death or a large number of patients