A decade ago, as a surgical resident at Stanford with a focus on trauma and critical care, Tim Sweeney, MD, PhD, found himself caring for a young man who had survived an ATV rollover accident. The patient’s organs were failing, and despite every advanced intervention the ICU could offer, his condition kept deteriorating. “I had him on all the fancy organ support tools in the ICU, but he was maxed out on therapy,” Sweeney told Inside Precision Medicine . “I went to my attending team and asked, ‘What else can we do?’ And the answer was: nothing. At that point, all there is is prayer.”

The moment crystallized a reality for Sweeney that many clinicians know: in sepsis, once supportive measures are exhausted, there is no specific medicine to offer. Patients’ lives hinge on the hope that

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