Abstract Rapid diagnosis, appropriate management, and time are the key factors for improving survival rate in many emergency clinical scenarios such as acute myocardial infarction, pulmonary embolism, cerebral stroke, and severe sepsis. Clinical signs and electrocardiographic, radiological, and echographic investigations associated with biomarkers usually allow a quick diagnosis in all of the above situations, except severe sepsis, in which the diagnosis in the early phases is often only presumptive. In sepsis, microbiological cultures are still considered the 'gold standard' for diagnosis, whereas the numerous biomarkers investigated are actually valuable only for patient stratification and evaluation of clinical course. In this issue of Critical Care , Que and colleagues describe the prognostic value of pancreatic stone protein/regenerating protein (PSP/reg) concentration in patients with severe infections. The data reported are interesting, but several questions about this biomarker arise, and further studies are needed to understand its role in sepsis and clinical practice.