ObjectiveTo investigate the clinical value of quick sequential organ failure assessment (qSOFA) score in predicting the outcome of patients with septic shock. MethodsWe collected the clinical data of 170 patients with septic shock treated in the Emergency Intensive Care Unit between January 2013 and January 2014. According to the 28-day outcomes of the patients, they were recorded as survival group and non-survival group. We calculated the qSOFA score, acute physiology and chronic health evaluation (APACHE)Ⅱ score on patients' admission. Using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve, we analyzed the qSOFA score, the effect of APACHE Ⅱ score in predicting the 28-day prognosis for patients with septic shock. The correlation between qSOFA score and APACHEⅡ score was also assessed. ResultsThe qSOFA and APACHEⅡ scores in non-survivors were higher than those in the survivors. According to ROC curve analysis, the area under the curve for qSOFA score and APACHE Ⅱ score was 0.666 and 0.791, respectively. For qSOFA score with 2 cut-off points to evaluate the prognosis of septic shock, the sensitivity was 62.7%, specificity was 61.1%, positive predictive value was 56.0%, negative predictive value was 67.4%, positive likelihood ratio was 1.61, and negative likelihood ratio was 0.61. For the APACHEⅡ score with 24 cut-off points to evaluate the prognosis of septic shock, the sensitivity was 70.7%, specificity was 80%, positive predictive value was 73.6%, negative predictive value was 67.3%, positive likelihood ratio was 3.54, and negative likelihood ratio was 0.37. The correlation coefficient of qSOFA score and APACHE Ⅱ score was 0.499. ConclusionThe qSOFA score is useful to evaluate the prognosis of the patients with septic shock early in Emergency Department.