Antimicrobial systems of the surgical wound. I. A comparison of oxidative metabolism and microbicidal capacity of phagocytes from wounds and from peripheral blood.

Oxygen consumption glucose oxidation via the hexose monophosphate shunt, and superoxide production by resting and stimulated leukocytes derived from rabbit blood and from experimental rabbit wounds five to seventeen days old were measured and compared. In vitro killing of staphylococci by blood and wound leukocytes was also measured. In all of these studies there were no significant functional differences between blood and wound cells. The data presented suggest that under the same in vitro conditions, blood and wound leukocytes are functionally equivalent, that tissue mobilization does not cause alteration of wound leukocytes, and that aging of the wound does not impair the microbicidal capacity of wound leukocytes.