Effect of local blunt muscle trauma on microvascular blood flow, relative hemoglobin amount and hemoglobin O₂ saturation.

<p>Animals (n = 8) were ventilated with 100% O₂. Parameters were determined immediately before trauma (base values, base), 1–2 minutes after trauma (0) and every 40 minutes until the end of the experimental period. flow, microvascular blood flow (A); rHb, relative hemoglobin amount, representing blood filling of microvessels (B); SO₂, microvascular hemoglobin O₂ saturation (C); AU, arbitrary unit; trauma, injured area of traumatized muscle; contralateral, respective area of the contralateral non-traumatized muscle. Values shown represent means ± SEM. *P<0.05 (versus base). ^#P<0.05 (versus contralateral; significant to all post trauma time points of flow and rHb except for flow at time point 160 minutes; not significant for SO₂, but post-hoc t-tests reveal significant differences between the groups for the time points 200 and 240 minutes).