Abstract
In cancer pa-tients, it is frequently observed that granulocyte in peripheral blood increases as their cancer progresses, and G/L ratio is used as an indicator of the host's clinical state. With this in mind, we developed an extracorporeal Granulocyte/Lymphocyte Regu-lation System. An in vitro screening test was designed to investigate a reduction of G/L before and after incubation of blood and 5 kinds of beads; poly-styrene, teflon, cellulose acetate, 6-nylon and glass. Among these materials, cellulose acetate showed most effective reduction of G/L. An exo vivo experiment was designed to assess the cellulose acetate beads in circula-tion system using blood. The G/L ratio was gradually decreased just after circulation, and showed a minimum after 90 min. of treatment. An in vivo experiment was designed to evaluate the efficacy of granulocyte adhesion and the safety of this system using dogs. Change of granulocyte was determined by measurement before and after column during circulation. Granulocyte adhesion rate to beads was 3.1% after 5 min., 71.5% after 10 min., 60.6% after 15 min., 77.1% after 20 min., 56.7% after 30 min., and 36% after 45 min. After circulation, WBC and granulocyte were recovered, and 9.2×108 of WBC were obtained from column. Dogs did not show any abnormality in laboratory data and general condition after extracorporeal circulation. These results suggest that cellulose acetate is the most suitable material for the reduction of granulocyte, and for the regulation of G/L ratio.
