Ej. Baker et al., TOLERANCE OF THE DEVELOPING HEART TO ISCHEMIA - IMPACT OF HYPOXEMIA FROM BIRTH, American journal of physiology. Heart and circulatory physiology, 37(3), 1995, pp. 1165-1173
Many infants who require cardiac surgery have cyanotic heart disease.
We assessed the relative tolerances to ischemia of hearts from immatur
e normoxemic rabbits versus hearts from immature rabbits subjected to
hypoxemia since birth. Normoxemic animals were raised from birth in an
environment where the inspired fractional concentration of oxygen (F-
IO2) was 0.21; for the hypoxemic studies F-IO2 was reduced to 0.09. He
arts (n = 6/group) from normoxemic and chronically hypoxemic rabbits a
t 7-12, 21-28, 35-44, and 51-56 days of age underwent aerobic ''workin
g'' perfusion with Krebs bicarbonate buffer, and cardiac function was
measured. Hearts were then arrested by a 3-min infusion with either co
ld (14 degrees C) Krebs buffer (hypothermia alone group) or St. Thomas
' Hospital II solution (hypothermia plus cardioplegia group) before 6
h of hypothermic (14 degrees C) global ischemia. Hearts were reperfuse
d, and postischemic creatine kinase leakage and recovery of function w
ere measured. For hearts protected with hypothermia alone, recovery of
aortic flow was better in hearts hyperemic from birth compared with n
ormoxemic controls at 7-12 days (78 +/- 7 vs. 60 +/- 6%, P < 0.05) and
21-28 days old (81 +/- 12 vs. 26 +/- 28%, P < 0.05). Protection with
hypothermia plus cardioplegia was also better in hearts hypoxemic from
birth compared with normoxemic controls at 7-12 days (74 +/- 8 vs. 63
+/- 10%, P < 0.05) and 21-28 days old (84 +/- 3 vs. 71 +/- 5%, P < 0.
05). Protection with hypothermia alone and hypothermia plus cardiopleg
ia was no different within chronically hypoxemic age groups. In normox
emic animals, protection with hypothermia alone gradually declined wit
h increasing age, while protection with hypothermia plus cardioplegia
progressively increased with age. Immature myocardium hypoxemic from b
irth was more tolerant of ischemia than normoxemic myocardium during e
arly stages of postnatal development when protected with either hypoth
ermia alone or hypothermic St. Thomas' II solution. This early protect
ive effect was rapidly lost as the chronically hypoxemic rabbit mature
d.