Surviving Sepsis Guidelines: A Continuous Move Toward Better Care of Patients With Sepsis.

Sepsis is a life-threatening condition that affects more than 1 million patients a year in the United States and even more patients around the globe and is one of the leading causes of death. Since the Declaration of Barcelona in 2002, the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine and the Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM) have launched several initiatives to decrease the mortality of patients with sepsis. The Surviving Sepsis Campaign (SSC) was launched in 2002 and has a 7-point agenda: building awareness of sepsis, improving diagnosis and recognition, defining and increasing the use of appropriate treatment and care, educating health care professionals, improving post–intensive care unit care, developing guidelines of care, and implementing a performance improvement program.