Brain Death Further Promotes Ischemic Reperfusion Injury of the Rabbit Myocardium Shankha S Biswas, Edward P Chen, Hartmuth B Bittner, R.Duane Davis, Peter Van Trigt The Annals of Thoracic Surgery Volume 62, Issue 6, Pages 1808-1815 (December 1996) DOI: 10.1016/S0003-4975(96)00814-4
Fig. 1 Modified isolated work-performing heart preparation used in this study. Three key features include the isolated heart suspended in a jacketed reservoir to minimize heart loss, an in-line flow probe to measure cardiac output, and a computerized data acquisition and cardiac function analysis system. (LA = left atrium; LV = left ventricle.) The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 1996 62, 1808-1815DOI: (10.1016/S0003-4975(96)00814-4)
Fig. 2 Left ventricular contractility (dP/dt) and relaxation (−dP/dt) in vivo after 2 hours of brain death. Both left ventricular contractility and relaxation were significantly decreased after brain death. (*p <0.05, before versus after brain death.) The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 1996 62, 1808-1815DOI: (10.1016/S0003-4975(96)00814-4)
Fig. 3 Stroke work is plotted against gradually increasing preload levels at a constant afterload of 63 mm Hg after 1 hour of global hypothermic ischemia. After ischemia, there was a significant decrease in stroke work in brain death hearts at preload of 15 to 20 mm Hg compared with controls. (*p <0.05, control versus brain death.) The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 1996 62, 1808-1815DOI: (10.1016/S0003-4975(96)00814-4)
Fig. 4 Coronary flow is plotted against gradually increasing preload levels at a constant afterload of 63 mm Hg after 1 hour of global hypothermic ischemia. After ischemia, there was a significant decrease in coronary flow in brain death compared with control hearts at preloads 0 to 5 and 15 to 20 mm Hg. (*p <0.05, controls versus brain death.) The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 1996 62, 1808-1815DOI: (10.1016/S0003-4975(96)00814-4)
Fig. 5 Photomicrograph of a longitudinal section of rabbit myocardium from a brain-dead animal after 1 hour of global hypothermic ischemia and reperfusion. There are multiple areas of contraction band formation and myocardial necrosis. (Hematoxylin and eosin; × 500 before 27% reduction.) The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 1996 62, 1808-1815DOI: (10.1016/S0003-4975(96)00814-4)