On October 1, 2015, the United States Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) issued acore measure addressing the care of septic patients. These core measures are controversial amonghealthcare providers. This article will address that there is no gold standard definition for sepsis, severesepsis or septic shock and the CMS-assigned definitions for severe sepsis and septic shock arepremature and inconsistent with evidence-based definitions. [West J Emerg Med. 2017;18(5)951-956.]