STANDARDIZATION OF THE LACTULOSE-MANNITOL TEST IN RATS - APPLICATION TO BURN INJURY

Intestinal permeability can be assessed by measuring urinary mannitol and lactulose excretion after oral administration. This test may be us eful as a tool in experimental studies to explore the effects of speci fic diets intended to promote the repair of the integrity of the gut b arrier. In this study we standardized the lactulose-mannitol test in r ats and applied it to a burned-rat model. The conditions were: oral ad ministration of an isotonic mixture of 50 mg of mannitol and 66 mg of lactulose, followed by aseptic collection of urine over 4 h. The incre ase in the lactulose/mannitol ratio in burned rats was due to higher l actulose excretion. These results corroborate those obtained in burn p atients and show that our model is suitable for further experiments on nutritional manipulation.