[Hydration in diabetic ketoacidosis. What is the effect of the infusion rate?]

Diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) involves severe volume depletion; usually a large volume of saline solution is used, but fluid reposition rate remains controversial. With the aim of properly defining fluid administration in DKA without associated illness, we performed a prospective, randomized study in 27 patients under two therapeutic regimes which differed only with regard to the repletion rate. Group 1 (14 patients) received 0.9% saline solution at a rate of 1000 ml/h, and group 2 (13 patients) at 500 ml/h. At admission to the hospital, at 2, 4, 8, 12 and 24 hours, arterial acid-base status and plasma sodium, potassium and chloride levels were measured. Both groups had similar biochemical characteristics at admission. All patients corrected the ketoacidotic disorder and there was neither mortality nor complications. We did not find any significant difference in any of the metabolic determinations among the different groups along the evolution. With regard to baseline determinations, in both groups, arterial pH increased after two hours. No changes were observed in anion gap, chloride, sodium or potassium among the therapeutic groups. We conclude that, regarding morbidity and mortality, in DKA patients without severe volume depletion it is equally effective to infuse 500 ml/h as 1000 ml/h as fluid repletion rate. Administration of modest amounts of fluids in these cases would result in reducing costs.