Sepsis and Inflammatory Response Mechanisms: An Activity Stress Model in Humans.

摘要

Sepsis is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in combat casualties. A major problem in developing successful treatment has been the lack of appropriate human experimental models. Conclusions from animal experimentation have been suspect because of inter-species differences in the nature and time course of inflammatory reactions from those encountered in human surgery. Prolonged and strenuous physical activity can in itself cause substantial clinical injury, potentially causing an excessive inflammatory reaction and immunosuppression which mirrors that seen following surgical trauma.. This has opened up prospects of developing a technique that would permit controlled studies of adverse immune reactions to trauma. The objectives of this contract were thus to develop an exercise model that maximized cellular and humoral immune changes, and to use this model to explore patterns of secretion of pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokines and hormones during the stress of heavy exercise.