Streamlining Sepsis Testing to Save Lives

Sepsis is a potent condition where the human immune system excessively attacks deadly pathogens/bacteria. Killing more than 225,000 Americans annually, sepsis left untreated can develop into septic shock, an even more dangerous condition where the blood pressure drops significantly (often causing permanent damage to the kidneys and other vital organs). Unfortunately, current methods used to diagnose sepsis take days to process, consuming valuable time for a patient whose symptoms can severely worsen. Traditional testing techniques for sepsis involve 2 time-consuming stages of blood culturing for bacteria growth and purification. After this second stage of purification, then only can a specialized treatment plan for a patient be developed. In the days it takes to obtain results, patients are only prescribed broad-treatment antibiotics, while the root of sepsis infection is still determined in lab testing. Nanoengineer Tae Hyun Kim and his fellow researchers have found a faster technique for diagnosing sepsis, promising to significantly reduce the turnaround time for sepsis test results. 

Rather than requiring two stages of blood culturing, Tae Hyun Kim and his team have been experimenting with nanoparticle injection into blood samples of sepsis patients. Specialized magnets then not only attract the nanoparticles out of the blood culture but the isolated pathogens as well. Following this, scientists can then observe (in a separate setting) with imaging algorithms that rapidly categorize the bacteria and their response to antibiotics. Lastly, the isolated pathogens can then be cultivated much faster in the purification stage of lab testing. Because the pathogens no longer have to grow in an environment of blood cells and the broad-ranging antibiotics potentially in a blood culture sample, testing of the blood culture can happen much faster, allowing for specialized treatment plans to be developed in less time. While there is optimism about the promise of this new nanoparticle-testing technique, work still needs to be done to avoid false negatives. The nanoparticle-testing technique runs the risk of not identifying pathogens absent in the initial blood draw from the patient. While slow, the traditional sepsis-testing technique is extremely efficient at avoiding false negatives, and this is a goal Tae Hyun Kim is working towards for his streamlined sepsis testing,

In initial testing, this new nanoparticle-testing technique achieved a 100% infection match rate from the isolated blood culture pathogens of 190 patients with suspected sepsis. While more clinical trials are needed to verify the efficacy of the test, this initial testing was promising to say the least. In the future, Kim and his team hope to develop a fully automated sepsis test that requires minimal human intervention (i.e. in situations when labs are closed or understaffed). 

Author: Abhinav Katyal 

Reference: 1. Yuan C. Lifesaving sepsis testing could be done in hours, not days, with a new method. Science News. July 24, 2024. Accessed August 11, 2024. https://www.sciencenews.org/article/new-sepsis-test-cut-result-wait-time.