Beating Hearts

Two hearts beating as one.

I t had been a turbulent year. Death and disease in the family had taken a toll on my personal life. Though I was a newlywed, life was anything but bliss. That month I was the resident in the cardiac intensive care unit (CICU); a challenging rotation, where sleep was a luxury and the long nights on call added to the strain on my relationship with my wife. It was on one of those nights that I me...

Developmental changes of intracellular Ca2+ transients in beating rat hearts.

Postnatal maturation of the rat heart is characterized by major changes in the mechanism of excitation-contraction (E-C) coupling. In the neonate, the t tubules and sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) are not fully developed yet. Consequently, Ca(2+)-induced Ca(2+) release (CICR) does not play a central role in E-C coupling. In the neonate, most of the Ca(2+) that triggers contraction comes through the...

Tygerberg Hospital keeps more hearts beating with pioneering service.

A pioneering life-and cost-saving radial angiography service in Tygerberg Hospital's cardiology department, the only one of its kind in Africa, is giving hundreds more patients unprecedented access to accurate diagnosis and treatment. Built around medical advances that allow both angiography and the often ensuing strategic placement of coronary stents to be done via the radial artery in the arm...

Hearts Beating for Liberty: Women Abolitionists in the Old Northwest

Intercapillary distance and capillary reserve in hypertrophied rat hearts beating in situ.

Functional intercapillary distance (ICD) was measured in stop-motion photomicrographs of hypertrophied, normally compensated, well oxygenated rat hearts beating in situ. Left ventricular hypertrophy was produced by salt loading and unilateral nephrectomy. Minimum ICD (when all capillaries are open) also was measured. Ventricular weight increased by 30-40% within 8-9 weeks after nephrectomy. To ...