Fig. 4

Cytokine production in whole blood in response to stimulation with toll-like receptor (TLR)2 and TLR4 agonists. Impaired IL-1β production after lipopolysaccharide stimulation of whole blood samples taken from patients in the first 12 h (cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) t1: n = 19), after 24 h (CPR t2: n = 19), and after 48 h (CPR t3: n = 14) following ROSC, compared to whole blood samples from patients with coronary artery disease (CAD: n = 19) (a). Impaired TNF-α production after stimulation with Pam₃CSK₄ of whole blood samples taken from patients in the first 12 h (CPR t1: n = 21), after 24 h (CPR t2: n = 22), and after 48 h (CPR t3: n = 15) after CPR, compared to whole blood samples from patients with CAD (n = 19) (b). The resulting cytokine concentrations were standardized to the patient’s white blood cell count. Statistical hypothesis testing was performed using the Kruskal–Wallis test and post-hoc analysis with all-pairwise comparison using the Dunn–Bonferroni approach (*p value ≤0.05; ***p value ≤0.001)