Articles: function.
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Observational Study
The impacts of thyroid function on the diagnostic accuracy of Cystatin C to detect acute kidney injury in ICU patients: a prospective, observational study.
Cystatin C (Cysc) could be affected by thyroid function both in vivo and in vitro and thereby may have limited ability to reflect renal function. We aimed to assess the association between Cysc and thyroid hormones as well as the effect of thyroid function on the diagnostic accuracy of Cysc to detect acute kidney injury (AKI). ⋯ There was no significant impact of thyroid function on the diagnostic accuracy of Cysc to detect AKI in ICU patients. However, the optimal cut-off value of Cysc to detect AKI could be affected by thyroid function.
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The RIFLE (Risk, Injury, Failure, Loss, and End-stage kidney disease) criteria were introduced in 2004, defining the clinical stage of acute kidney injury (AKI) and outcome measures based on serum creatinine, glomerular filtration rate, and urine output. However, a growing body of evidence suggests that these markers are insufficient in drawing an accurate illustration of kidney injury. Indeed, mortality and morbidity remain high in AKI, suggesting that accuracy and speed of patient evaluation are lacking. ⋯ Improvements in diagnosis, risk identification, stratification, prognosis, and therapeutic monitoring will benefit clinical decision-making in the individualized bundling of therapies and ongoing patient management. In particular, kidney protection and AKI prevention may become feasible if an earlier and more accurate diagnosis is made for AKI. Here, we discuss the opportunity to consider whether NGAL is ready for routine clinical use in a number of etiologies of AKI.
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Sepsis is still a leading cause of morbidity and mortality, even in modern times, and thrombocytopenia has been closely associated with unfavorable disease outcome. Decreases in mitochondrial membrane potential (depolarization) were found in different tissues during sepsis. Previous work suggests that mitochondrial dysfunction of platelets correlates with clinical disease activity in sepsis. However, platelet mitochondrial membrane potential (Mmp) has not been investigated in a clinical follow-up design and not with regard to disease outcome. ⋯ In this study, we demonstrated that mitochondrial membrane depolarization in platelets correlates with clinical disease severity in patients with sepsis during the disease course and may be a valuable adjunct parameter to aid in the assessment of disease severity, risk stratification, and clinical outcome.
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Sleep in intensive care unit (ICU) patients is severely altered. In a large proportion of critically ill patients, conventional sleep electroencephalogram (EEG) patterns are replaced by atypical sleep. On the other hand, some non-sedated patients can display usual sleep EEG patterns. In the latter, sleep is highly fragmented and disrupted and conventional rules may not be optimal. We sought to determine whether sleep continuity could be a useful metric to quantify the amount of sleep with recuperative function in critically ill patients with usual sleep EEG features. ⋯ Sleep continuity measurements could constitute a clinically relevant and reproducible assessment of sleep disruption in non-sedated ICU patients with usual sleep EEG.
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Critical care medicine · Jan 2014
Improved Cardiac and Neurologic Outcomes With Postresuscitation Infusion of Cannabinoid Receptor Agonist WIN55, 212-2 Depend on Hypothermia in a Rat Model of Cardiac Arrest*.
To investigate the mechanisms of improved myocardial and neurological function and survival following i.v. administration of cannabinoid receptor agonist, WIN55, 212-2 in a rat model of cardiac arrest. ⋯ In a rat model of cardiac arrest, better postresuscitation myocardial function, neurological deficit scores, and longer duration of survival were observed by the pharmacologically induced hypothermia with WIN55, 212-2. The improved outcomes of cardiopulmonary resuscitation following administration of WIN55, 212-2 appeared to be the results from its temperature reduction effects.