美国国家公共电台 NPR Doctor Turns Up Possible Treatment For Deadly Sepsis

 

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Sepsis, or blood poisoning, is the nation's third-leading cause of death. Researchers now say they've developed a treatment that has been remarkably¹ effective. Here's NPR's Richard Harris.

RICHARD HARRIS, BYLINE²: One January day two years ago, Dr. Paul Marik was running the emergency room at a hospital in Norfolk, Va., when a desperately³ ill woman came in.

PAUL MARIK: We had this 48-year-old woman who previously⁴ had been reasonably healthy but came in with rapid, overwhelming sepsis.

HARRIS: Sepsis is a severe form of inflammation often triggered by an infection and frequently deadly.

MARIK: Her kidneys weren't working. Her lungs weren't working. And it was absolutely clear to me that she was going to die. In a situation like this, you start kind of thinking out of the box.

HARRIS: Marik had recently read a research report from scientists at Virginia Commonwealth⁵ University which found that intravenous vitamin C helped their patients with sepsis. He figured, what the heck? And he threw in some steroids and another vitamin for good measure.

MARIK: I was expecting that the next morning when I came to work, she would be dead. And really, when I walked in the next morning, I got the shock of my life.

HARRIS: The woman quickly recovered. Marik, at the Eastern Virginia Medical School, tried it in two more patients - same happy result. And 47 more - four of those patients died, he reports in the journal Chest. But they died from diseases that sent them to the hospital in the first place.

MARIK: The remarkable⁶ thing is not a single patient died from sepsis.

HARRIS: Especially remarkable considering that sepsis usually kills about a third of all patients who develop it. The study lacked the typical checks. There was no control group. Doctors and nurses knew who was getting the treatment. But the results were enough to change the way Marik treats sepsis.

MARIK: Now every single patient who is admitted, you know, without exception, gets it.

HARRIS: And by his informal tally⁷, of 150 patients to date, only one has died from sepsis. I asked Dr. Craig Coopersmith at Emory University how big a deal this is.

CRAIG COOPERSMITH: If it turns out, on further studies, that this is true and we can validate⁸ it, then this will be an unbelievably huge deal. But right now, it should be viewed as a preliminary deal that needs to be validated⁹.

HARRIS: There have been hundreds of studies of sepsis, many of them which seemed promising¹⁰ at first. But no drug has survived the more carefully controlled follow-up studies. Billions of dollars have been spent looking for a solution that might in fact end up being a mix of inexpensive ingredients.

Richard Harris, NPR News.

(SOUNDBITE OF TIRED PONY'S "I DON'T WANT YOU AS A GHOST")

1 remarkably   

ad.不同寻常地，相当地

参考例句：

• I thought she was remarkably restrained in the circumstances. 我认为她在那种情况下非常克制。
• He made a remarkably swift recovery. 他康复得相当快。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 desperately   

adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地

参考例句：

• He was desperately seeking a way to see her again.他正拼命想办法再见她一面。
• He longed desperately to be back at home.他非常渴望回家。

4 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。

5 commonwealth   

n.共和国，联邦，共同体

参考例句：

• He is the chairman of the commonwealth of artists.他是艺术家协会的主席。
• Most of the members of the Commonwealth are nonwhite.英联邦的许多成员国不是白人国家。

6 remarkable   

adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的

参考例句：

• She has made remarkable headway in her writing skills.她在写作技巧方面有了长足进步。
• These cars are remarkable for the quietness of their engines.这些汽车因发动机没有噪音而不同凡响。

7 tally   

n.计数器，记分，一致，测量；vt.计算，记录，使一致；vi.计算，记分，一致

参考例句：

• Don't forget to keep a careful tally of what you spend.别忘了仔细记下你的开支账目。
• The facts mentioned in the report tally to every detail.报告中所提到的事实都丝毫不差。

8 validate   

vt.（法律）使有效，使生效

参考例句：

• You need an official signature to validate the order.你要有正式的签字，这张汇票才能生效。
• In order to validate the agreement,both parties sign it.为使协议有效，双方在上面签了字。

9 validated   

v.证实( validate的过去式和过去分词 )；确证；使生效；使有法律效力

参考例句：

• Time validated our suspicion. 时间证实了我们的怀疑。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• The decade of history since 1927 had richly validated their thesis. 1927年以来的十年的历史，充分证明了他们的论点。 来自辞典例句

10 promising   

adj.有希望的，有前途的

参考例句：

• The results of the experiments are very promising.实验的结果充满了希望。
• We're trying to bring along one or two promising young swimmers.我们正设法培养出一两名有前途的年轻游泳选手。