Endotracheal aspirates contain a limited number of lower respiratory tract immune cells

[...]there is a paucity of information regarding whether ETAs are a reasonable surrogate for bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) to study lung specific immune responses in critically ill patients. [...]these findings suggest that ETA samples contain populations of immune cells from the lower respiratory tract of critically ill patients with respiratory failure, but that these samples are not necessarily a surrogate for BALF in research studies. Carmen Mikacenic View author publications You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar Contributions MO, EM, CM, and MMW designed the experimental study, VD was vital to sample processing and study coordination, and JH provided invaluable expertise and helped with data analysis. Crit Care 25, 14 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13054-020-03432-1 Download citation * Received: 21 October 2020 * Accepted: 10 December 2020 * Published: 06 January 2021 * DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s13054-020-03432-1 [RAW_REF_TEXT] Research Letter [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Open Access [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Published:06 January 2021 [/RAW_REF_TEXT] Endotracheal aspirates contain a limited number of lower respiratory tract immune cells [RAW_REF_TEXT] Marika Orlov ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-1961-08131 , [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Eric D. Morrell1,2 , [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Victoria Dmyterko2 , [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Jessica A. Hamerman3 , [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Mark M. Wurfel2 & [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Carmen Mikacenic3 [/RAW_REF_TEXT] Critical Care volume 25, Article number: 14 (2021) Cite this article [RAW_REF_TEXT] 383 Accesses [/RAW_REF_TEXT] [RAW_REF_TEXT] Metrics details [/RAW_REF_TEXT] To the editor: