1. The document discusses a quality improvement project focused on optimizing sepsis care through early identification and treatment. It identifies sepsis as a major health concern and notes that delayed identification is a key challenge. 2. It recommends developing a data-driven analytical system using machine learning to help clinicians detect sepsis in real-time. This would allow for rapid intervention and reduced mortality. 3. Additional best practices identified include increasing training for clinicians on analytical tools for sepsis identification, integrating robust educational programs on early identification and treatment, and increasing research funding to develop improved treatment plans.

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Quality Improvement Project – Sepsis Action Plan
Student’s Name:
Course Name:
Institution Affiliation:
SWOT Analysis of Sepsis
SWOT analysis would involve analyzing thee strengths,
weaknesses, opportunities and threats of sepsis as a clinical
issue in the healthcare industry. Consequently, this would serve
to form the basis of providing foundation for an action plan for
quality improvement of sepsis. One of the biggest strengths
regarding sepsis is that its screening has aided in saving many
lives today. According to data from the National Library of
Medicine, sepsis screening has aided in reducing the mortality
rate (Kim & Park, 2019). Reduced mortality rate has been
attributed to the early identification and treatment of sepsis.
Undeniably, sepsis screening has been enhanced through use of
tools such as the systemic inflammatory response system

2. (SIRS). Further, these sepsis screening tools have enhanced
efficiency and effectiveness in terms of detecting sepsis.
For these reason, morbidity and mortality rates related to sepsis
have massively reduced thus improving the overall efficiency of
health systems globally. However, despite the strength, there
exist weaknesses regarding the clinical issue of sepsis. For
instance, one of the biggest weaknesses has been the issue of
non-compliance especially of bedside nurses completing the
sepsis screening. Bedside nurses refer to healthcare
professionals who handle the personal healthcare issues of
patients. In this scenario, this has always led to delays in
utilization and positive impacts of sepsis bundle. Delayed sepsis
bundle would then increase the risk of progression to septic
shock. It is crucial to point out that delayed septic bundle is
linked to a more than twofold rise in mortality rates of patients
with sepsis after onset. On the flip side, sepsis as a clinical
issue has presented numerous opportunities for healthcare
professionals, patients and the system itself. First, reducing
mortality rates related to sepsis is one of the most significant
aspects that can be explored by healthcare professionals
globally.
To achieve this, the healthcare system and professionals must
leverage on boosting early detection and treatment of sepsis to
help save many lives globally (Carr, 2018). On top of this, there
opportunity to develop a fast-acting treatment plan for sepsis
without considering the source of the infection has present itself
to the global healthcare system. Additionally, there still exist
threats when dealing with the clinical issue of sepsis. Patients
in today’s healthcare system are at an increased risk of sepsis.
A classic example would be patients undergoing foley catherer
as this would increase the risk of sepsis (Melzer & Welch,
2017). On top of this, patients would be at risk of an infection
that can then lead to sepsis and this can also be attributed to
time spent by a patient in hospital.
Action Plan for Quality Improvement
It would be essential to integrate the systemic inflammatory

3. response system (SIRS), as an analytical tool bas it has proven
to be effective in undertaking of screening of patients to
effectively and efficiently detect and identify sepsis. Over time,
SIRS has remained to be one of the most commonly utilized
sepsis screening tool when identifying septic patients.
Additionally, it is important apart from using SIRS, healthcare
professionals ought to diversify their analytical frameworks
when detecting and identifying sepsis (Ebai, 2017). Apart from
focusing all efforts and actions plans in the healthcare
environment, there is need to also focus on the outside.
Specifically, there is need to accelerate sessions and training to
parents and communities in terms of sepsis awareness and this
can be accelerated through use of social media as a means of
communication. Eventually, sepsis awareness would aid in
timely and effective response to sepsis thus saving many lives
in the short and long run. To sum up, investing in research and
development of technologies aimed at boosting detection and
identification of sepsis would be a game changer in improving
health outcomes of patients in the long run.
Reference
Carr, C. F. (2018). Tools to Increase Compliance and Decrease
Mortality Due to Sepsis.
The University of Southern Mississippi
https://aquila.usm.edu/dnp_capstone/104/
Ebai, D. B. (2017). Screening Tools Used by Nurses to Identify
Sepsis in Adult Patients.
https://www.theseus.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/137994/Ebai_Ba
beh%202.pdf?sequence=1
Kim, H. I., & Park, S. (2019). Sepsis: Early recognition and
optimized treatment.
Tuberculosis and respiratory diseases,
82(1), 6-14.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6304323/
Melzer, M., & Welch, C. (2017). Does the presence of a urinary

4. catheter predict severe sepsis in a bacteraemic cohort?
Journal of Hospital Infection,
95(4), 376-382.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhin.2017.01.003
3
Collect price information for each stock from Yahoo! Finance
(finance.yahoo.com) as follows:
1. Enter the stock symbol. On the page for that stock, click
“Historical Prices” on the left side of the page.
2. Enter the “start date” as March 1, 2013 and the “end date” as
March 30, 2018 to cover the five-year period. Make sure you
click “monthly” next to the date; the closing prices reported by
Yahoo! will then be for the last day of each month.
3. After hitting “Get Prices,” scroll to the bottom of the first
page and click “Download to Spreadsheet.” If you are asked if
you want to open or save the file, click open.
4. Copy the entire spreadsheet, open Excel, and paste the Web
data into a spreadsheet. Delete all the columns except the date
and the adjusted close (the first and last columns).
5. Keep the Excel file open and go back to the Yahoo! Finance
Web page and hit the back button. If you are asked if you want
to save the data, click no.
6. When you return to the prices page, enter the next stock
symbol and hit “Get Prices” again. Do not change the dates or
frequency, but make sure you have the same dates for all the
stocks you will download. Again, click “Download to
Spreadsheet” and then open the file. Copy the last column,
“Adj. Close,” paste it into the Excel file and change “Adj.
Close” to the stock symbol. Make sure that the first and last
prices are in the same rows as the first stock.

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Quality Improvement Project - Sepsis
Student’s Name:
Course Name:
Institution Affiliation:
1.
Identify the clinical issue that will be the focus of your
Quality Improvement project.
The importance of undertaking and implementing quality
improvement project in the healthcare environment cannot be
understated. It would serve to boost the performance in a
specific healthcare environment. Optimization of sepsis care is
the first clinical issue that the quality improvement project
would focus on. Sepsis is becoming a major health concern
globally as there is high risk of death when one gets it.
Specifically, delayed sepsis identification has been one of the
biggest impediments to achieving desirable health outcomes
among patients. However, integrating an analytical system as
part of the quality improvement project will help in optimizing

6. sepsis care. Specifically, this will involve early identification of
sepsis through use of a robust data-driven approach. Developing
this type of analytical system such as machine learning would
help clinicians to have real-time actionable data that will then
aid in boost early detection of sepsis (Klompas et al., 2020).
Consequently, requisite health interventions would be
implemented. On top of this, there would be rapid intervention
concerning severe sepsis and this will help reduce mortality and
improve health outcomes among patients. One of the most
significant challenges when dealing with sepsis is that scientists
have not been able to come up with an approved medicine that
can help in targeting the impaired or aggressive immune system.
For this reason, the need for clinicians to have access to high
quality and robust analytical systems aimed at detecting sepsis
would be crucial.
2.
Provide rationale for the need to change the status quo.
Additionally, the current status quo with respect to sepsis is that
there is lack of a robust analytical system aimed at detecting
and identifying sepsis at an early stage. Globally, there is an
ongoing debate especially in the healthcare industry regarding
the exact timing of treatment for sepsis. In this perspective,
incorporating a robust early detection and identification system
for sepsis can be vital in boosting sepsis survival rates globally.
Clinicians are the first line of care especially for patients who
are at a critical stage of sepsis. There exist various reasons why
there is need to shift from the status quo regarding sepsis and
implement actionable, efficient and robust analytical
frameworks for sepsis. First, it will aid in saving many lives of
people affected by sepsis. The analytical system will aid in
early detection, identification and diagnosis of sepsis by
clinicians thus boosting survival rates and achieve desirable
outcomes among patients. The cost of treating sepsis especially
at later stages can be very high. Increased cost can make many
patients shy away from accessing such care as they cannot
afford it. However, early detection and diagnosis is not

7. expensive and in this case, patients would achieve desirable
outcomes within a short time (Kim & Park, 2019). Eventually,
many lives of patients with sepsis will be saved thus positively
impacting families, communities and nations.
3.
Identify best practices from the literature related to the
issues.
In this, increasing training especially for clinicians and nurses
will go a long way in significantly improving sepsis
recognition. Specifically, training them on how to use analytical
frameworks for sepsis would be very crucial. Secondly,
integrating a robust educational framework in sepsis ought to be
leveraged by the global health industry to ensure high quality
care and standardization. Specifically, the educational
programmes anchored on sepsis would incorporate early
identification, appropriate prescription and boosting care of
patients (Rello & Rubulotta, 2018). Lastly, there is need for
increased funding towards research anchored on sepsis to
develop and implement high quality treatment plans for patients
thus improving health outcomes in the long run.
Reference
Kim, H. I., & Park, S. (2019). Sepsis: Early recognition and
optimized treatment.
Tuberculosis and respiratory diseases,
82(1), 6-14.
Klompas, M., Osborn, T. M., & Rhee, C. (2020). Who owns
sepsis?
Annals of internal medicine,
172(3), 210-211.
Rello, & Rubulotta. (2018). Best practice for sepsis.
PubMed Central (PMC).
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5906331/