In the present issue of Critical Care, Linder and colleagues

present a new study in which they assess the clinical importance of serial measurements of heparin-binding protein (HBP) plasma levels in critically ill septic and nonseptic patients [1]. Th ey found that HBP plasma levels are signifi cantly higher in patients with severe sepsis and septic shock in comparison with patients with a nonseptic critical condition. Th e authors also demon-strated that HBP plasma levels obtained at admission to the ICU and during the last individual sampling are higher in nonsurvivors as compared with survivors in both the septic group and the whole study group. More-over, the high baseline HBP plasma levels in septic patients were associated with an increased 28-day mor-tality rate. Altogether, these results indicate that serial HBP measurements might be very helpful in stratifi catio