Sepsis and septic shock are common medical conditions associated with significant morbidity, mortality and healthcare expense. Identifying high blood lactate levels in time in septic patients may allow faster detection of those patients who require immediate resuscitation. Point-of-care testing is being increasingly used in the emergency department.

In this article, the authors examined the accuracy and timesaving effect of a handheld lactate analyser for the measurement of fingertip and whole blood lactate as compared with reference laboratory blood testing in emergency department patients with sepsis. The aim of this article is to assess the accuracy of portable lactate analysers when compared with reference laboratory testing in septic patients arriving to the emergency department.

Serum lactate levels obtained in the emergency department can predict mortality among patients with suspected infection and can be used to guide early resuscitation.

This prospective cohort was conducted in a Pakistani hospital. The inclusion criteria enlisted adult patients of more than 18 years of age, presenting to the emergency department with severe sepsis/septic shock.

At the time of arrival to the emergency department, fingertip lactate measured with a hand-held analyser correlated strongly with the laboratory reference method at the time of arrival. It was concluded that agreement is good between both methods.

Patients suffering with severe sepsis or septic shock tipically have high blood lactate levels. The Surviving Sepsis Guidelines have instituted a protocol for resuscitation of a septic patient which incorporates lactate as a biomarker for the detection and for gauging the effectiveness of therapy.

This article was written by Muhammad Akbar Baig, Hira Shahzad, Erfan Hussain, Asad Mian and published in 2017 by World Journal of Emergency Medicine (World J Emerg Med, Vol 8, No 3, 2017)

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