Archives of Critical Care Medicine

Context: Sepsis is a common, expensive, and frequently fatal condition that is associated with as many deaths annually as is acute myocardial infarction.

Evidence Acquisition: Sepsis could alter different pathways and cause inflammation, coagulation, apoptosis, and mitochondrial oxidative stress and dysfunction. This review focuses on new prognostic biomarkers of mortality due to mitochondrial oxidative stress in septic patients.

Results: Recently some biomarkers of mitochondrial oxidative stress have been associated with prognosis in septic patients; they include circulating levels of malondialdehyde, total antioxidant capacity, melatonin level, platelet level of cytochrome c oxidase (COX) or mitochondrial respiratory complex IV, and mitochondrial deoxyribonucleic acid (mtDNA) haplogroup.

Conclusions: Some biomarkers of mitochondrial oxidative stress (e.g. circulating levels of malondialdehyde, total antioxidant capacity, melatonin level, platelet level of COX, mtDNA haplogroup) have been recently associated with mortality in septic patients. These biomarkers could assist in the prognostic classification of septic patients and open new research lines in their treatment