| - Objectives: To determine the correct methodology, interpretation and value of tonometric variables obtained in the stomach in healthy volunteers and in the critically ill. This is a multidisciplinary working group. - Results: Gastric acid secretion suppression with ranitidine is obligatory if meaningful data are to be obtained, even if, following ischemia, gastric acid secretion is partly and transiently inhibited, in postcardiac surgery patients. The predictive value of a tonometric rise in intragastric pCO2 for major morbidity and mortality after cardiac surgery seems limited, however. The current research further focuses on the effect of exercise on intragastric tonometric pCO2, in healthy volunteers and in patients with suspected splanchnic vascular disease. In the latter patients, an increase in intragastric pCO2 appeared of predictive value for angiographic and symptomatic lesions in the abdominal vascular tree. We also study the predictability of intrasgastric tonometric pCO2 on tolerance to intragastric feeding and on the effect of gastric and intraduodenal feeding on the intragastric pCO2, in critically ill patients in the intensive care unit. |
