Water distribution in blood during sickling of erythrocytes
FW Fales
Plasma urea and protein determinations proved suitable for measuring
changes in total diffusible water and plasma volume in whole blood.
Deoxygenation by saturation with carbon dioxide at 25 degrees C caused no
change in plasma urea, but a significant increase in plasma protein
concentration was induced with both normal and sickle-cell (HbSS) blood.
Thus in HbSS blood there was no binding or trapping of water as a result of
sickling and there was a normal influx of water into the cells (Bohr
effect) despite the polymerization of the hemoglobin molecules with
sickling. Consistent with this observation was the finding that the
deoxygenation induced a similar increase in concentration of the plasma
cations, sodium plus potassium. HbSS erythrocytes neither lost nor gained
water under the more physiologic conditions of deoxygenation with a 95%
nitrogen, 5% carbon dioxide gas mixture.
Volume 51,
Issue 4,
pp. 703-709,
04/01/1978
Copyright © 1978 by The American Society of Hematology
