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  • Effect of Early Parenteral Nutrition on the HPA Axis and on Treatment With Corticosteroids in Intensive Care Patients.

Effect of Early Parenteral Nutrition on the HPA Axis and on Treatment With Corticosteroids in Intensive Care Patients.

The Journal of clinical endocrinology and metabolism (2015-05-06)
Philippe Meersseman, Eva Boonen, Bram Peeters, Sarah Vander Perre, Pieter J Wouters, Lies Langouche, Greet Van den Berghe
ABSTRACT

Nutrition can affect the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis. We hypothesized that early administration of parenteral nutrition (PN) during critical illness reduces plasma ACTH and cortisol concentrations and thereby increases the use of corticosteroids. This is a preplanned substudy of a randomized controlled trial (EPaNIC) that compared early PN with late PN in 4640 critically ill patients. We investigated the effect of early vs late PN on any steroid treatment and on treatment for ≥ 5 days to capture patients with clinical suspicion of adrenal insufficiency, and assessed whether this was related to an effect on septic shock. Also, in a propensity score-matched subgroup (n=174) of patients not receiving steroids, plasma ACTH and (free) cortisol were quantified. Compared with late PN, more patients on early PN received treatment with corticosteroids (26.2% vs 23.8%; P = .05) and with corticosteroids for ≥ 5 days (14.0% vs 11.9%; P = .03). However, plasma ACTH and (free) cortisol concentrations were unaffected and thus could not explain the higher use of corticosteroids with early PN. Instead, more patients developed new septic shock with early PN (17.0%) than with late PN (14.2%) (P = .01). In multivariate logistic regression analysis, new septic shock was an independent determinant for ≥ 5 days steroid treatment (odds ratio, 6.25; 95% confidence interval, 4.93-7.94; P < .0001), statistically explaining the effect of early PN on steroid treatment. Early PN did not affect plasma concentrations of ACTH and (free) cortisol, but increased the incidence of septic shock, which statistically explained why more patients on early PN received corticosteroids.

MATERIALS
Product Number
Brand
Product Description

Sigma-Aldrich
Bromocresol Green, ACS reagent, Dye content 95 %
Sigma-Aldrich
Bromocresol Green, JIS special grade
Sigma-Aldrich
Bromocresol Green Sultone Form, for microscopy (Bot., Hist., Vit.), indicator (pH 3.8-5.4)
Sigma-Aldrich
Bromocresol Green solution, pH 3.8-5.4