Comparison between carotid corrected flow time changes in septic shock patients induced by fluid challenge tests

Objective We aimed to compare between Carotid Corrected Flow Time (CCFT) Changes in septic shock patients induced by fluid challenge tests. Design: A prospective, open-label, randomized, controlled, parallel-arm, and monocentric.Settings and patients This study was carried out on 200 septic shock cases.Intervention and main variable of interest Patients were randomized 1:1 as an intervention group receiving 500 ml of intravenous glucose 5% over 5 min and a standard group receiving 500 ml of intravenous saline solution over 5 min then carotid artery corrected flow time shift was compared between the baseline and after the fluid expanded to its final state.Results After treatment, average heart rate was 97 ± 11 and 102 ± 11 beat/min in the standard care and intervention groups of both cohorts decreased significantly in comparison (p < .001). Similarly, the average MAP was 63 ± 5 and 66 ± 3 in the standard care and intervention groups, respectively, with no significant difference (p = 0.132). No significant difference existed between the two groups after treatment (p = 0.154), average Ccft differed significantly between both groups with a larger increase among the intervention group (p = 0.005). But Ccft change revealed no discernible variation between the two groups.Conclusions In septic shock patients, there were no differences in changes occurred in carotid artery corrected flow time induced by normal saline and glucose 5% intravenous infusions and percentage of fluid responder to non-responder in each group; so glucose 5% is not inferior to normal saline as it made closely similar stroke volume variations identified by carotid corrected flow time measurement.