Clinical use of intravenous fat in surgical patients.

An intravenous fat emulsion (Lipomul I. V.) has recently become available for clinical use. Utilizing a 15% emulsion of cottonseed oil with soybean phosphatides and Pleuronic F-68 ( oxyethyleneoxypropylene polymer) as stabilizers, it is prepared with 4% dextrose in water as a vehicle. 1 A preliminary report from the surgical service of the Illinois Research and Educational Hospitals 2 indicated that this improved fat emulsion was sufficiently free of side-effects to make it safe for routine clinical use. The most prominent reactions noted in this study were a transient minor hypertensive response in 48% of infusions and a transient temperature elevation in 1.6% of patients. Studies on this preparation have since been extended to include an additional 95 patients, who have received a total of 580 units of intravenous fat for an average consumption of 6 units per patient. Each unit contained 500 or 600 cc. of fat emulsion, depending on