Table 4.

The problems and challenges of immunotherapy in human sepsis⁵⁴

Runaway inflammation may not be responsible for the mortality of sepsis and therefore immunotherapy alone would not be expected to work. The wrong hypothesis

Study design may have been flawed. Right question, wrong study design

Given the complexity of the inflammatory cascade along with the inbuilt redundancy within the system means that either we need to know precisely which phase of the response the patient is currently in or we risk making matters worse. Or at best the patient is able to compensate because of the overlap between the various regulators of inflammation. Right question, wrong agent at wrong time

Enrolment criteria have largely been based on non-specific clinical signs and have resulted in a mixed population to study. Right question, wrong target group