Awareness Into Action: Summa Health’s Progress in Ohio’s Fight Against Sepsis

Sepsis is a life-threatening emergency that can become deadly quickly, making early recognition and treatment critical. More than 1.7 million people in the U.S. are diagnosed with sepsis each year, and approximately 350,000 adults die from it annually.

For Michelle Evans, one of many health care professionals working to advance sepsis care across Ohio’s hospitals, improving those outcomes has been a five-year mission at Summa Health.

Before Evans arrived at the health system, neither her current position as sepsis program coordinator nor the program she now leads existed. Now, she oversees efforts across two main campuses and two freestanding emergency departments, tracks compliance and mortality, reviews hundreds of cases each month, provides education, works with emergency departments and helps distribute data to physician and nursing champions.

All that work has yielded tangible improvement. Evans said compliance rates have nearly doubled during her tenure. And Summa Health is just one example of the work that’s happening within OHA member hospitals and health systems statewide.

For over a decade, Ohio hospitals have collaborated to improve outcomes and reduce costs specific to sepsis care. OHA’s statewide initiative to reduce Ohio’s sepsis mortality rate achieved a 13.5% reduction, saving 1,659 lives from 2023 through 2025. Ohio hospitals continue to focus on early sepsis recognition and early, appropriate clinical intervention.

Read our full story on Evans and Summa Health here.

Access OHA’s sepsis resources here.