Project Grant R01HD117962

Federal Grant Award Summary

The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) awarded a $749,653 Project Grant to the University of Colorado-Denver on June 25, 2026, under the Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research program (CFDA 93.865) to develop and validate pediatric sepsis screening and diagnostic criteria for emergency care settings. The research addresses a critical public health need, as sepsis affects approximately 25 million children annually worldwide with 3.4 million deaths. Building upon the previously developed Phoenix criteria for pediatric sepsis, this project will create evidence-based screening tools to identify at-risk children early in emergency departments and prehospital settings where treatment initiation occurs. The research will leverage three large datasets encompassing over 3 million pediatric emergency visits and incorporate input from a multidisciplinary expert panel comprising emergency physicians, nurses, prehospital clinicians, and pediatric intensive care physicians.

Deliverables include two primary products: (1) Specific Aim 1 will produce validated suspected sepsis criteria using machine learning and an iterative data-driven Delphi process to predict Phoenix sepsis classification while accounting for clinical feasibility and implementation context, and (2) Specific Aim 2 will design and evaluate prototype electronic health record (EHR) and mobile clinical decision support tools optimized for prehospital, general emergency department, and pediatric emergency department environments. The project will be completed by February 28, 2031, and is expected to substantially improve early sepsis recognition and treatment initiation across the emergency care continuum.