Hospital deaths in patients with sepsis from 2 independent cohorts.

Sepsis, the inflammatory response to infection, affects millions of patients worldwide.1 However, its effect on overall hospital mortality has not been measured. We quantified the contribution of sepsis to mortality in 2 complementary inpatient cohorts from Kaiser Permanente Northern California (KPNC) and the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS).