TY - JOUR T1 - To catch a killer: electronic sepsis alert tools reaching a fever pitch? JF - BMJ Quality & Safety JO - BMJ Qual Saf SP - 693 LP - 696 DO - 10.1136/bmjqs-2019-009463 VL - 28 IS - 9 AU - Halley Ruppel AU - Vincent Liu Y1 - 2019/09/01 UR - http://qualitysafety.bmj.com/content/28/9/693.abstract N2 - Sepsis is a global health priority of staggering impact, resulting in at least 6 million deaths worldwide each year and contributing to as many one half of all hospital deaths in the USA.1–4 Sepsis is also tremendously costly, as reflected in total healthcare expenditures,5 6 short-term and long-term morbidity and mortality7–9 and the heavy burden placed on caregivers and society.10 11 Large-scale efforts, including those of the WHO and the Global Sepsis Alliance, have helped to elevate sepsis to a highly prominent concern visible to ‘the public, political leaders and leaders of healthcare systems’.1 12 Emerging public awareness campaigns—for example, the Sepsis Alliance’s ‘It’s About TIME’ motto emphasises Temperature, Infection, Mental decline and Extreme illness as concerning patient symptoms13—further drive home the need for timely and aggressive patient screening, identification and treatment. Together, these clarion calls highlight the need to leverage all available tools and modalities to enhance the earlier identification and treatment of patients to combat sepsis.Not surprisingly, over the last decade, we have witnessed a rapid expansion in the number of electronic sepsis alert tools in development or use, particularly in locales that have also seen widespread deployment of modern electronic health record (EHR) systems.14 In some cases, simpler rule-based sepsis screening or prognostication tools, built around the systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) or quick Sepsis-related Organ Failure Assessment (qSOFA) criteria,15–18 have been electronically implemented as sepsis ‘sniffers’ that offload the burden of sepsis detection in patients who already meet relevant clinical criteria.14 In other cases, the role of these simpler ‘predictive’ models has been questioned alongside … ER -