Figure 3
Ex-vivo stimulation assay in effluents of different PET dwell times. (a) Levels of IL-6 (left) and TNF-α (right) in 9 ml effluent samples of the indicated dwell times, after direct ex-vivo stimulation by LPS and/or Pam3Cys (100 ng/ml as indicated) for 24 h at 37 °C. Effluents from 6 patients of the randomized controlled trial without AlaGln supplementation. IL-6 and TNF-α release after maximum stimulation differed at all dwell times (*p < 0.05 vs. control per dwell time) (b) Measured cytokine levels as normalized per 106 cells. IL-6 and TNF-α release were significantly higher at all dwell times (1, 4 and 16 h) after maximum stimulation with 100 ng/ml LPS plus 100 ng/ml Pam3Cys (*p < 0.05 vs. control per dwell time). After normalization for peritoneal cell count the difference between the 1 h dwell and the 4 h and 16 h dwells was significant (*p < 0.05), whereas cytokine release values at 4 h and 16 h were indistinguishable. Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed rank test was used to calculate p-values.
