Teng J, Xiang L, Long H, et al. - It was shown that in critically ill patients, serum citrulline and D-lactate were correlated with the severity of gastrointestinal failure (GIF), and the combination of citrulline and D-lactate improved the diagnostic efficacy to distinguish GIF.

• Researchers recruited a sum of 110 critically ill patients with an acute gastrointestinal injury who were admitted to ICU.

• They found lower serum levels of citrulline in patients with gastrointestinal dysfunction (GID) or GIF, while higher levels of D-lactate and lipopolysaccharide (LPS) than healthy control (HC).

• In comparison with GID patients, there was a reduction in the serum level of citrulline, while D-lactate and LPS were increased in GIF patients.

• The results showed that serum levels of citrulline, D-lactate, and LPS were correlated with the APACHE II and SOFA score in patients with GID or GIF.

• The data demonstrated that citrulline and D-lactate were risks for both GID and GIF in this logistics regression analysis.

• As per the findings, ROC curve analysis demonstrated that the combination of citrulline and D-lactate had a relatively high value to distinguish GID from HC, GIF from GID, and GIF from HC.