A SCHEME to tackle sepsis at Warrington Hospital has received international interest.

Two nurses were specially appointed to tackle the potentially life-threatening condition in March and May.

Since then, sepsis nurse specialists Fiona Sparkes and Kaley Long have worked to raise awareness across Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

Sepsis occurs when the body's response to an infection injures its own organs or tissues, and can lead to organ failure or death if not properly treated.

For every hour that antibiotics aren't administered to sepsis patients, the mortality rate increases by eight per cent.

Symptoms include slurred speech, extreme shivering or muscle pain, not passing urine for a whole day, severe breathlessness and mottled or discoloured skin.

Fiona said: “We are picking up patients with patients with some quite nasty infections and they’re getting the appropriate treatment in a timely manner which means that their outcomes are better.

“There are so many different ways that sepsis can present - it depends where the infection is and there are certain levels of severity as well.

“You just need to educate people on sepsis and keep pushing it.

“We’ve raised the awareness to identify patients at an early stage."

Fiona and Kaley have made sepsis training mandatory at Warrington Hospital, held drop-in awareness sessions with staff and introduced sepsis boxes and trolleys to allow quick access to medicines and equipment.

Trusts from across the country and as far away as Germany and the USA have contacted the hospital to learn more about its practises.

Fiona added: “We had a patient who came into the surgical assessment unit and they received antibiotics within an hour of arrival.

“Normally they would have been admitted onto the ward and probably have been in hospital for about a week, but because they got that dose they had 48 hours of IV antibiotics before they could go home with no further complications."