[Cerebrospinal fluid glucose, lactate and pyruvate concentration in patients with cerebral infarction after...

The determinations of the above substances were done in the blood and CSF of 27 patients with cerebral infarction and 10 controls. The glucose level was determined in the blood and CSF and lactate and pyruvate levels in the CSF before and in the 8th and 16th minutes after a glucose load. The 0-toluidine colorimetric method was used for glucose and spectrophotometric methods were applied for determination of lactate and pyruvate. In the patients with recent cerebral infarction as compared with the control group an increase of glucose concentration was found in the blood (statistically significant) and in the CSF (statistically not significant), while the levels of lactate and pyruvate were raised in the CSF before as well as in the 8th and 16th minutes of the test. Absence of a statistically significant difference between lactate and pyruvate concentrations in the CSF in the same patients with recent cerebral infarction before and in the 8th and 16th minutes of the test suggests that glucose in a hypertonic solution failed to exert any significant influence on CSF lactate and pyruvate concentrations. These biochemical findings seem to support the observations of good therapeutic effects of glucose in hypertonic solution in some cases of cerebral infarction.