Meningococcal septicaemia: identification and management by paramedics

Meningitis and septicaemia strike without warning and can kill in hours. Few infectious diseases have such a devastating impact. The disease can bring a healthy person near death within 24 hours. Babies, children and young adults are most at risk from meningitis and septicaemia, and as many as one in ten people who get the disease will die (Prasad and Karlupia, 2007).

Of those that do survive, one quarter will suffer from long-term effects such as deafness and epilepsy. While several vaccines, including the highly successful MenC, have had a huge impact on disease incidence, lack of a universal vaccine that protects against all forms of the disease means that recognizing the signs and symptoms is key to combating this deadly disease.

In particular, knowledge of the recently identified early warning ‘red flag’ symptoms can help speed up diagnosis and treatment and help to improve outcomes.

The Meningitis Research Foundation (MRF) provides resources for health professionals to help diagnose and treat meningitis and septicaemia. Recently, MRF re-launched its life-saving series of algorithms for the management of meningococcal disease and bacterial meningitis in children and young people. These protocols are aimed at doctors in emergency medicine, paediatrics, paediatric intensive care units, anaesthetics and general medicine in the UK.