Sepsis is one of the leading causes of preventable deaths in hospitals. This study presents the evaluation of a quality collaborative, which aimed to decrease sepsis-related hospital mortality.
The German Quality Network Sepsis (GQNS) offers quality reporting based on claims data, peer reviews, and support for establishing continuous quality management and staff education. This study evaluates the effects of participating in the GQNS during the intervention period (April 2016–June 2018) in comparison to a retrospective baseline (January 2014–March 2016). The primary outcome was all-cause risk-adjusted hospital mortality among cases with sepsis. Sepsis was identified by International Classification of Diseases (ICD) codes in claims data. A controlled time series analysis was conducted to analyze changes from the baseline to the intervention period comparing GQNS hospitals with the population of all German hospitals assessed
Seventy-four hospitals participated, of which 17 were university hospitals and 18 were tertiary care facilities. Observed mortality was 43.5% during baseline period and 42.7% during intervention period. Interrupted time-series analyses did not show effects on course or level of risk-adjusted mortality of cases with sepsis compared to the national DRG-statistics after the beginning of the intervention period (
As long as hospital-wide sepsis quality improvement efforts will not become a high priority for the hospital leadership by assuring adequate resources and involvement of all pertinent stakeholders, voluntary initiatives to improve the quality of sepsis care will remain prone to failure.