the impact of sex differences on renal protective effects of lipopolysaccharide preconditioning in septic shock

Background: induction of septic shock by lipopolysaccharide (lps) may lead to acute renal failure. the present study aimed to investigate the impact of sex differences on the effectiveness of low-dose lps preconditioning (lps-pc) on lps-induced acute renal failure in rats. methods: this study was conducted at tehran university of medical sciences, in 2017. a total of 48 wistar rats were equally divided into two groups of male and female rats. the rats in each group were then allocated to three groups (n=8 per group), namely control, septic shock, and lps-pc group. a high dose of lps was administered for septic shock induction. lps-pc was induced by injecting lps before sepsis induction. the effect of sex differences on renal functional indices, renal oxidative stress markers, plasma tumor necrosis factor-α level, and renal histological changes was evaluated. data were analyzed using two-way anova followed by tukey’s post hoc test. results: in the septic shock groups, renal functional parameters (creatinine [cr] and blood urea nitrogen [bun]) were increased in both sexes. however, the increase was more significant in male rats (male rats: cr=2.14±0.13, bun=81±4.15; female rats: cr=1.64±0.12, bun=50±2.7). lps-pc reduced these indices in both sexes (male rats: cr=1.24±0.03, bun=57±4.1; female rats: cr=0.86±0.02, bun=30.31±2.25). renal superoxide dismutase (sod) activity (male rats: 11.54±1.34, female rats: 24.4±2.04) and catalase (cat) activity (male rats: 15±1.74, female rats: 25.75±1.97) were significantly higher in the female septic group. lps-pc significantly increased sod (male rats: 25.7±2.45, female rats: 42.6±3.31) and cat (male rats: 37.25±2.34, female rats: 59.21±3.29) activities in renal tissue samples in the lps-pc group in both sexes compared to the septic groups. in the lps groups, plasma tumor necrosis factor-α (male rats: 375±25.65, female rats: 285.45±25.94) were significantly higher than in the lps-pc groups (male rats: 250±21.35, female rats: 121±24.14). conclusion: male rats were more susceptible to sepsis-induced renal damage. lps-pc had protective effects on the lps- induced renal injury, and these effects were most prominent in female rats.