Figure 4. Dose-dependent effects of intravenous anesthetics on spontaneous and lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated release of tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-[small alpha, Greek] into cultured blood. Anesthetics were added to the culture system at concentrations achievable during clinical conditions (A) or in pharmacologic concentrations exceeding the aforementioned concentrations 10-fold (B). TNF-[small alpha, Greek] was measured using an enzyme-linked immunoabsorbent assay system in plasma obtained 25 h after the onset of whole-blood cultures in supernatants obtained after 25 h; after in half of the wells were additionally stimulated with LPS (1 [micro sign]g/ml). Box plots represent twenty-fifth/seventy-fifth percentile, median, and range. * indicates P < 0.05 compared to respective time-matched cultures in the absence of intravenous anesthetics.