My speech on sepsis is the following:
“The government in their infinite wisdom has created a system of check boxes and if you check enough boxes the government thinks you might be septic. So if you have a fever and your heart is beating over 90 times a minute because you have a fever and you have a source of infection that is enough to meet criteria.
Back in the day that used to mean you were really sick and might be in my ICU on medications to maintain your blood pressure but now it means you checked enough boxes.
What does that mean to you? It means we are going to treat you more aggressively and do some frequent testing to make sure you are responding appropriately.”
Now there is still real sepsis and people who are really sick but we over identify it in many people
Now blood cultures being positive, meaning you are growing bacteria in your blood is something else and called bacteremia. With it you may or may not actually be septic.