Shock : molecular, cellular, and systemic pathobiological aspects and therapeutic approaches : the official journal the Shock Society, the European Shock Society, the Brazilian Shock Society, the International Federation of Shock Societies
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Early differential diagnosis of systemic inflammatory reactions in critically ill patients is essential for timely implementation of lifesaving therapies. Despite many efforts made, reliable biomarkers to discriminate between infectious and noninfectious causes of systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) are currently not available. Recent advances in mass spectrometry-based methods have raised hopes that identification of spectral patterns from serum/plasma samples can be instrumental in this context. ⋯ Taken together, our data demonstrate that plasma protein profiling allows reproducible discrimination between patients with infectious and noninfectious SIRS with high sensitivity and specificity. However, rigorous standardization as well as considering drug-related interferences is essential when interpreting protein profiling studies. Identification of discriminatory proteins suggests a direct link between infectious-related protease activity and a sepsis-specific diagnostic pattern for discrimination of patients with SIRS.
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Bronchial circulation plays a critical role in the pathophysiology of burn and smoke inhalation-induced acute lung injury. A 10-fold increase in bronchial blood flow is associated with excessive production of nitric oxide (NO) following smoke inhalation and cutaneous burn. Because an increased release of neuropeptides from the airway has been implicated in smoke inhalation injury, we hypothesized that direct delivery into the bronchial artery of low-dose 7-nitroindazole (7-NI), a specific neuronal NO synthase inhibitor, would attenuate smoke/burn-induced acute lung injury. ⋯ The increase in malondialdehyde and nitrate/nitrite in lung tissue was attenuated by treatment. Our data strongly suggest that local airway production of NO contributes to pulmonary dysfunction following smoke inhalation and burn injury. Most mechanisms that drive this pathophysiology reside in the airway.
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Pulse pressure variation (PPV) is a promising predictor for volume responsiveness. However, recent studies have criticized its validity during small tidal volume (TV) ventilation. The present study evaluated the influence of pressure control level (PCL) on PPV. ⋯ The PPV as well as the slopes of the trend lines decreased from hypovolemic stages toward hypervolemic stages. Pulse pressure variation responds rapidly to change in ventilator setting and is linearly correlated with the PCL and TV. These characteristics may have important applications in critical care to improve the interpretation of PPV in accord to different ventilator settings.
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Blunt chest trauma is known to induce a pulmonary invasion of short-lived polymorphonuclear neutrophils and apoptosis of alveolar epithelial type 2 (AT2) cells. Apoptotic cells are removed by alveolar macrophages (AMΦ). We hypothesized that chest trauma alters the phagocytic response of AMΦ as well as the mediator release of AMΦ during phagocytosis. ⋯ These findings indicate that chest trauma augments the phagocytosis of apoptotic cells by AMΦ. Phagocytosis of opsonized beads enhances and ingestion of apoptotic cells downregulates the immunologic response following lung contusion. Our data emphasize the important role of phagocytosis during posttraumatic inflammation after lung contusion.
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A growing body of evidence indicates that anesthetic agents may play some roles in the cardiovascular and immune systems after injury. Myocardial anesthetic preconditioning is found to be involved in the anesthetic-induced cardioprotective effect. ⋯ Moreover, through anti-inflammatory effects and antioxidant properties, the anesthetic agents are believed to modulate immune response of individuals after injury. Thus, alteration or modulation of cardiovascular and immune function by the administration of anesthetic agents to the patients at the time of injury appears to be appropriate and important.