Bolter, Chris P., and Suzanne J. Wilson. Influence of right atrial pressure on the cardiac pacemaker response to vagal stimulation. Am. J. Physiol. 276 (Regulatory Integrative Comp. Physiol. 45): R1112–R1117, 1999.—We have recently shown that the intrinsic rate response to an increase in right atrial pressure is augmented when cardiac muscarinic receptors are activated. This present study exami...

The interest for the antifibrillatory effect of vagal stimulation has been largely limited by the fact that this concept seemed restricted to acute experiments in anesthetized animals. To explore the potentially protective role of vagal stimulation in conscious animals we developed a chronically implantable device to be placed around the cervical right vagus. An anterior myocardial infarction w...

Cervical vagal stimulation for 2 h results in a depressed baroreflex sensitivity produced by an enhanced sympathetic output, as indicated by increased plasma norepinephrine levels. The current study examined the role of the insular cortex in modulating the vagal stimulation-induced changes in baroreflex sensitivity. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were anesthetized with thiobutabarbitol sodium and ins...

progression of HF.10 Vagus stimulation reverses ventricular remodeling of the failing heart. Increasing parasympathetic activity stimulates endothelial nitric oxide generation. Right vagus stimulation in patients with advanced HF is feasible and safe and the consequent increased vagal tone improves the symptoms of HF and significantly increases the left ventricular ejection fraction. Acetylchol...

We examined the effects of stellate ganglia stimulation on the phase-dependent chronotropic and dromotropic responses to brief vagal bursts in open-chest anesthetized dogs. Stellate stimulation affected the phasic vagal effects on heart rate by shortening the latent period, shifting the phase at which maximum decrease in heart rate occurred to earlier phases, and reducing the maximum decrease i...

The vagal system regulates the atrioventricular conduction time ( T AV) via two opposing mechanisms: a direct effect on the atrioventricular node and an indirect effect through changes in heart period ( T AA). To evaluate how dynamic vagal activation affects T AV, we stimulated the vagal nerve with frequency-modulated Gaussian white noise and estimated the transfer function from vagal stimulati...

Vagal nerve stimulation is an important adjunctive therapy for medically refractory epilepsy and major depression. Additionally, it may prove effective in treating obesity, Alzheimer's disease, and some neuropsychiatic disorders. As the number of approved indications increases, more patients are becoming eligible for surgical placement of a commercial vagal nerve stimulator (VNS). Initial VNS p...