Fig. 3

Dimethylarginine-dimethylaminohydrolase 2 (DDAH2) expression in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC). a DDAH2 expression levels in PBMC. DDAH2 expression was significantly lower in patients than controls (P < 0.01) but there was no difference between patient groups (non-significant (ns)). Total mRNA was prepared from PBMC and DDAH2 expression levels were assessed by quantitative PCR (qPCR) in controls (n = 22) and in patients (n = 45). b Patients with declining Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA) scores (delta-SOFA) from day 1 to day 3 (n = 22) were compared with patients with rising or unchanged delta-SOFA (n = 5). DDAH2 expression was lower in patients with rising SOFA than in patients with falling or unchanged SOFA (P < 0.05). The relative expression values were calculated using glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) as an internal standard and are presented by the delta-delta cycle threshold (Ct) method using the mean value of controls for standardization. The horizontal line in the box is the median value; the box extends to the interquartile range (25–75th centile) and the whiskers to the minimum and maximum values. The group differences were calculated using the non-parametric Kruskal-Wallis test for trend analysis for more than two gropus and non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test for two groups.