Acute pancreatitis is an inflammatory disease of pancreas, and can be due to biliary stones, alcohol, trauma, infections, and sometimes it is hereditary. Most of the patients with severe acute pancreatitis will have complications such as shock, sepsis, pulmonary insufficiency, and renal failure which have considerable morbidity and mortality. Severity of pancreatitis and organ damage is dependent to the balance between pro-inflammatory and anti-inflammatory factors. The aim of this study is to measure the effect of plasmapheresis in severe acute pancreatitis, and to assess feasibility of plasmapheresis in these patients and its complications.
In this phase I trial we have only one (intervention) group. 15 patients with severe acute pancreatitis, who are admitted to Tabriz Imam Reza Hospital, are included in this study after signing informed consent. Severe acute pancreatitis is diagnosed by Ranson criteria equal or greater than 7. Patients are hospitalized in surgical ICU and standard acute pancreatitis treatments are started. Dialysis catheter is inserted and plasmapheresis with FFP is administered every other day (3 times totally). Plasmapheresis will be discontinued after symptom improvement. Hospital length of stay, ICU length of stay, mortality, pancreatitis complications, blood ESR and CRP, palsmapheresis times, and plasmapheresis complications are documented.