Figure 2.

Overall mortality rate and sepsis-related mortality rate according to American College of Chest Physicians/Society of Critical Care Medicine Consensus Conference definitions. A progressively higher mortality was observed as systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) was due to infection, namely sepsis, and as more severe organ dysfunctions were present, namely severe sepsis and septic shock. The first column shows mortality from the group of patients who met SIRS criteria but who had no infection; in that case there was no sepsis-related death.