A quick blood test could revolutionise the diagnosis of sepsis, says a Daily Mail report. Developed by the inventor of the home pregnancy test, it takes ten minutes to look for proteins that are a sign of sepsis, the UK's leading cause of avoidable death. Every hour treatment is delayed increases the risk of death by 7%, so early diagnosis is key. But current tests take up to three days to provide results. The new test to detect sepsis from a few drops of blood within minutes could be a “game changer”, doctors say.
The report says it is the brainchild of Paul Davis, who invented the first simple home pregnancy test in 1980s, and his Bedfordshire-based healthcare company Mologic. “It's as simple as a pregnancy test to do,” Davis said. In lab tests the kit picked up more than 80% of sepsis cases.
Results of a trial on 550 intensive care patients at a large London hospital are due in the next few weeks and are expected to confirm the preliminary figures, the report says.
[link url="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-7765313/The-simple-blood-test-spot-sepsis-TEN-minutes-help-prevent-52-000-deaths-year.html"]Daily Mail report[/link]