BACKGROUND Accumulation of β-amyloid protein (Aβ) and tau protein is the main feature of Alzheimer disease neuropathogenesis. Anesthetic isoflurane, but not desflurane, may increase Aβ levels in vitro and in animals. Therefore, we set out to determine the effects of isoflurane and desflurane on cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) levels of Aβ and tau in humans. METHODS The participants were assigned in...

BACKGROUND Metastatic recurrence of ovarian cancer is the foremost cause of postoperative mortality. With recent research indicating that inhalation of anaesthetics may influence cancer cell behaviour, this study investigated the effects of isoflurane on the expression of tumorigenic markers and proliferative capacity in ovarian cancer cells. METHODS Ovarian cancer (SK-OV3) cells were culture...

Response properties of the middle layers of feline primary auditory cortex neurons to simple sounds were compared for isoflurane versus pentobarbital anesthesia in a within subject study control design. Initial microelectrode recordings were made under isoflurane anesthesia. After a several hour washout period, recordings were repeated at spatially matched locations in the same animal under pen...

BACKGROUND Hypothermia has been shown to decrease the requirement for inhaled anesthetics in animals, but information in humans is limited. METHODS Thirty-three unpremedicated children with congenital left-to-right shunt heart diseases undergoing open heart surgeries were assigned to one of three groups, with nasopharyngeal temperatures at the time of skin incision of 37, 34, or 31 degrees C....

I.v. anaesthetic agents, including propofol, have not been shown to inhibit hypoxic pulmonary vasoconstriction (HPV). This may encourage the use of propofol in thoracic surgery where one lung ventilation (OLV) is required. We have compared the effects of maintaining anaesthesia with either isoflurane or propofol infusion on right ventricular function and shunt fraction. We studied 10 patients w...

Dexmedetomidine has significant neuroprotective effects. However, whether its protective effects can reduce neurotoxicity caused by isoflurane in fetal brain during the second trimester of pregnancy remains unclear. In this study, timed-pregnancy rats at gestational day 14 spontaneously inhaled 1.5% isoflurane for 4 hours, and were intraperitoneally injected with dexmedetomidine at dosages of 5...

BACKGROUND Isoflurane has been reported to cause dose-dependent constriction in isolated coronary microvessels. However, these results are inconsistent with data from in situ and in vivo heart preparations which show that isoflurane dilates the coronary vasculature. To clarify the direct effects of isoflurane on coronary tone, we measured the response of isolated porcine resistance arterioles (...

Glutamate transporters regulate extracellular concentrations of glutamate, an excitatory neurotransmitter in the central nervous system. We have shown that the commonly used anesthetic isoflurane increased the activity of glutamate transporter type 3 (excitatory amino acid transporter 3, EAAT3) possibly via a protein kinase C (PKC)-dependent pathway. In this study, we showed that isoflurane ind...

BACKGROUND A prolonged isoflurane exposure may lead to cognitive decline in rodents. Neuregulin 1 (NRG1)-ErbB4 signaling plays a key role in the modulation of hippocampal synaptic plasticity through regulating the neurotransmission. The authors hypothesized that hippocampal NRG1-ErbB4 signaling is involved in isoflurane-induced cognitive impairments in aged mice. METHODS Fourteen-month-old C5...

BACKGROUND Fourier bicoherence has previously been applied to investigate phase coupling in the EEG in anaesthesia. However, there are significant theoretical limitations regarding its sensitivity in detecting transient episodes of inter-frequency coupling. Therefore, we used a recently developed wavelet bicoherence method to investigate the cross-frequency coupling in the EEG of patients under...