Publication: Plasma nitrogen oxides and blood lactate concentrations in Ghanaian children with malaria
Issued Date
1997-01-01
Resource Type
ISSN
00359203
Other identifier(s)
2-s2.0-0030926010
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Mahidol University
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SCOPUS
Bibliographic Citation
Transactions of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. Vol.91, No.3 (1997), 298-302
Suggested Citation
Tsiri Agbenyega, Brian Angus, George Bedu-Addo, Benjamin Baffoe-Bonnie, George Griffin, Patrick Vallance, Sanjeev Krishna Plasma nitrogen oxides and blood lactate concentrations in Ghanaian children with malaria. Transactions of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. Vol.91, No.3 (1997), 298-302. doi:10.1016/S0035-9203(97)90083-3 Retrieved from: https://repository.li.mahidol.ac.th/handle/20.500.14594/18000
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Title
Plasma nitrogen oxides and blood lactate concentrations in Ghanaian children with malaria
Abstract
Nitric oxide is an important host defence molecule as well as being a mediator in many pathophysiological processes. To investigate its role in severe malaria, we measured plasma nitrate and nitrite concentrations in 70 children with malaria (54 with severe malaria) and 48 control subjects (33 with medical conditions and 15 surgical patients). We related these measurements to plasma lactate concentrations, an established marker of disease severity in malaria. Plasma lactate levels were significantly elevated in patients with deep coma (P = 0.0007) and those with a fatal outcome, but mean nitrogen oxide concentrations were not significantly different in the 2 outcome categories and were not related to depth of coma (P > 0.5). In patients whose cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was examined, lactate concentrations were elevated in fatal cases (geometric mean 8.2 mmol/L, n = 5) compared with survivors (3.4 mmol/L, n = 13; P = 0.032); corresponding CSF nitrogen oxide concentrations were 10.7 μM in fatal cases compared with 12.5 μM in survivors (P = 0.5). Plasma nitrogen oxide concentrations were negatively correlated with admission parasitaemia (r = -0.41, n = 70; P < 0.0001). In our population, elevations of plasma lactate, but not nitrite or nitrate, reflected disease severity in malaria.