SOFA criteria predict infection-related in-hospital mortality in ICU patients better than SIRS criteria and the qSOFA score

Commentary on : Raith EP, Udy AA, Bailey M, et al . Prognostic accuracy of the SOFA score, SIRS criteria, and qSOFA score for in-hospital mortality among adults with suspected infection admitted to the intensive care unit. JAMA 2017;317:290–300. The Third International Consensus Definitions for Sepsis and Septic Shock (Sepsis-3) has redefined sepsis, now defining sepsis as a life-threatening organ dysfunction caused by a dysregulated host response to infection, with organ failure defined as a two-or-more-point change in the Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA) score.1 The new sepsis definition was determined in a retrospective cohort of both intensive care unit (ICU) and non-ICU encounters.2 The quick SOFA (qSOFA) score (altered mentation, systolic blood pressure ≤100 mm Hg and respiratory rate ≥22/min) was also introduced as a possible useful predictive tool among patients outside the ICU. This external validation study compares the discrimination …