Prolonged sepsis patients, hospitalized for 4 weeks or more in the ICU, had high plasma concentrations of total cortisol on day 7 (median patients: 20.83 μg/dl (IQR 15.26–26.93) versus healthy controls: 13.75 μg/dl (IQR 12.36–18.99)) in the face of low plasma ACTH concentrations (median patients: 17.88 pg/ml (IQR 13.73–27.41) versus healthy controls: 30.29 pg/ml (IQR 18.70–40.25)), whereas from ICU day 35 and ICU day 21 onwards, plasma concentrations of total cortisol and ACTH, respectively, were no longer different from those in healthy control subjects (Fig. 1b). This evidence concerns the gene POMC and Sepsis.