[Transfer of CO after prolonged artificial ventilation (18 young people after their stay in the neuro-surgery department) (author's transl)].

We studied the transfer of CO (TLCO) on 18 young people after their stay in the neuro-surgery department, during which they had been submitted to prolonged artificial ventilation. The values of TLCO measured after the single breath method and that of the steady state are all reduced. No statistical correlation has been brought to light between the length of artificial ventilation, or the FiO2 and the lowering of TLCO, or between the seriousness of the pulmonary complications which occurred and the disturbance of the pulmonary function test. To explain the change of the alveolo-capillary diffusion, different factors can be brought in, such as: artificial ventilation, the toxicity of oxygen, the adult respiratory distress syndrome, but also the presence of brain lesions which by reflex artery, modify the local hemodynamic conditions and the surfactant synthesis.