Effects on skeletal muscle of intravenous glutamine supplementation to ICU patients.

Abstract

To evaluate the effect of four doses of intravenous glutamine supplementation on skeletal muscle metabolism. A prospective, blinded, randomized study. The general Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of a university hospital. ICU patients with multiple organ failure (n=40), who were expected to stay in the unit for more than five days. Patients received 0, 0.28, 0.57 or 0.86 g of glutamine per kg bodyweight per day intravenously for five days as part of an isocaloric, isonitrogenous and isovolumetric diet. Plasma glutamine concentration responded to glutamine supplementation with normalization of plasma levels in a dose-dependent way, while free muscle glutamine concentration, as well as muscle protein synthesis and muscle protein content, did not change significantly. Intravenous glutamine supplementation to ICU patients for a period of five days resulted in normalization of plasma glutamine concentrations in a dose-dependent way whereas muscle glutamine concentrations were unaffected.