Effect of thermal injury and immunosuppression on the dissemination of Candida albicans from the mouse gastrointestinal tract.

Candida albicans dissemination through the gastrointestinal tract was examined in mice given a thermal injury, immunosuppressive therapy, or both. After gastrointestinal tract colonization with C. albicans, mice were initially subjected to a 20% total body surface area, full-thickness, dorsal scald burn. Only one mouse in the burned group (5%) had evidence of C. albicans in the liver at the time the mice were killed. No dissemination was observed in sham-burned animals. When mice were immunosuppressed with cyclophosphamide, an increased incidence of gastrointestinal tract dissemination was noted in burned (31%) and sham-burned (23%) mice; however, only 3 days after burn was there a significant difference in dissemination between burned and sham-burned mice (p less than 0.02). This corresponded to the day of severest neutropenia in response to cyclophosphamide treatment. The results of the study indicate that C. albicans can disseminate from the gastrointestinal tract in response to thermal injury, but a significant suppression of the immune response must occur for the event to be commonplace.