acute phase reaction
Last reviewed 01/2018
The acute phase reaction describes the global systemic physiological response to acute insults such as inflammation by:
- fever
- chills
- lethargy
- increased catabolism of protein
- increase in slow wave sleep
- decreased appetite
- hypotension
- neutrophilia
- increase in acute phase proteins
The likely instigators of all of these effects are cytokines, most likely IL-1 and TNF. They are released by peripheral monocytes in direct relation to the level of inflammation, hypothetically to increase the level of acute phase proteins necessary for their activity.