OBJECTIVES Butorphanol tartrate is a synthetic opioid partial agonist analgesic. Butorphanol targets the heart, mainly via κ-opioid receptor (κ-OR) activation. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect and mechanism underlying butorphanol postconditioning (B-Post) on myocardial ischaemia reperfusion injury in rats. METHODS Seventy-five male Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly divide...

Ca(2+) is the main trigger for mitochondrial permeability transition pore opening, which plays a key role in cardiomyocyte death after ischemia-reperfusion. We investigated whether a reduced accumulation of mitochondrial Ca(2+) might explain the attenuation of lethal reperfusion injury by postconditioning. Anesthetized New Zealand White rabbits underwent 30 min of ischemia, followed by either 2...

Inhibition of mitochondrial permeability transition pore (mPTP) opening by cyclosporin A or ischemic postconditioning attenuates lethal reperfusion injury. Its impact on major post-myocardial infarction events, including worsening of left ventricular (LV) function and death, remains unknown. We sought to determine whether pharmacological or postconditioning-induced inhibition of mPTP opening mi...

BACKGROUND Isoflurane and sevoflurane have been shown to elicit myocardial postconditioning, but the effect of desflurane remain unknown. The authors studied the mechanisms involved in desflurane-induced myocardial postconditioning. METHODS Contracting isolated human right atrial trabeculae (34 degrees C, stimulation frequency 1 Hz) were exposed to 30-min hypoxia followed by 60-min reoxygenat...

To the Editor: Drenger et al. have demonstrated that sevoflurane postconditioning is cancelled in the rat heart with type 1 diabetes mellitus and that this adverse effect by glucose intolerance cannot be restored by the adjustment of blood glucose using insulin. This study appears to have many questions regarding the mechanisms of insulin’s action, whereas we would congratulate their impressive...

OBJECTIVE To assess the effects of ischemic postconditioning on left ventricular function in isolated rat hearts. METHODS Twenty-four Wistar rats were used. These hearts underwent perfusion by modified LANGERDORFF method and distributed into three groups: GI--control (n=8); GII--three cycles of postconditioning of 10/10s (n=8); GIII three cycles of postconditioning of 30/30s (n=8). After a 15...

It has been demonstrated that ischemic postconditioning (IPO) is capable of attenuating ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury in the heart. However, the novel role of pharmacological postconditioning in the liver remains unclear. In this study, the hypothesis that diazoxide postconditioning reduces I/R-induced injury in rat liver was tested. Rats were assigned randomly to the sham-operated control,...