MOLECULAR, HISTOPATHOLOGICAL AND ULTRASTRUCTURAL STUDIES OF LANGENDORFF RAT HEART. THE IMPACT OF ISCHEMIC PRECONDITIONING

The potential clinical relevance of ischemic preconditioning (IP) on ischemia-reperfusion injury is a major object of clinical research to find new methods of cardioprotection in humans. The aim of our study was to characterise the Langendorff model of rat heart investigating different durations of ischemia and reperfusion and (IP) protocol on myocardial ischemia reperfusion injury, to test the potential clinical relevance of (IP) phenomenon on infarct size, to assess genomic DNA integrity and histological and ultrastructural changes in heart muscle. Our results revealed that as ischemia and reperfusion time is extended, the level of infarction is also increased. We concluded that 20 minutes stabilisation and 45 minutes ischemia followed by 30 minutes reperfusion seems to povide a compliant platform to study ischemia reperfusion injury. Protection using (IP) was induced by 2 cycles 5' ischemia and 5' reperfusion prior lo lethal ischemia reperfusion protocols. The reduction in infarct size in IP hearts pointed out that inhibition of apoptosis is one of the mechanisms which participate in elicting the increased rezistance to ischemia.