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American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine Vol 177. pp. 798, (2008)
© 2008 American Thoracic Society

Correspondence

The Breathing Control Puzzle during Chronic Acid–Base Imbalance

To the Editor:

We read with great interest the article by Dr. Kiwull-Schöne and colleagues (1), which unveils the role of NHE3 in controlling the level of alveolar ventilation in rabbits and thus concerns the specialist dealing with breathing control.

Previous studies from our lab found considerable variability of PCO2 values in arterial blood in a large group of rabbits (2). In the article by Kiwull-Schöne and colleagues, the difficulties associated with the elevated reflex peripheral chemosensitivity in rabbits have been elegantly overcome by administration of supplemental oxygen.

However, two questions arise that we would like to pose to the authors: (1) What evidence exists that after 2 days NH4Cl-induced metabolic acidosis has reached its steady state? (2) It is expected that the liver and muscles, besides the kidneys, will also take part in metabolizing NH4Cl (3); is this organ interaction taken into account and documented in this study? Despite these questions, the article is intriguing and makes it possible to understand the age and gender variability of PCO2 and their role in different pathological conditions.

Dimiter Iluchev, Stefan Kostianev and Blagoi Marinov

Medical University of Plovdiv
Plovdiv, Bulgaria

FOOTNOTES

Conflict of Interest Statement: None of the authors has a financial relationship with a commercial entity that has an interest in the subject of this manuscript.

REFERENCES

  1. Kiwull-Schöne H, Kiwull P, Frede S, Wiemann M. Role of brainstem sodium/proton exchanger 3 for breathing control during chronic acid–base imbalance. Am J Respir Crit Care Med 2007;176:513–519.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  2. Ilucev D. About the normal values of the acid-base and oxygen indices in small laboratory animals—rats and rabbits. Folia Med (Plovdiv) 1974;16:231–240.[Medline]
  3. Kuntz E, Kuntz H-D. Biochemistry and functions of the liver. In: Kuntz E, Kuntz H-D, editors. Hepatology: principles and practice. Heidelberg, Germany: Springer-Verlag Berlin; 2002. pp. 26–62.




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HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
Proc. Am. Thorac. Soc. Am. J. Respir. Cell Mol. Biol.
Copyright © 2008 American Thoracic Society