Needles to promote ventricular blood into the ischemic myocardium applied in a rat heart transplant model: an acute observation [corrected]

Two needles were designed in order to revascularize an ischemic myocardium in the event of left coronary artery occlusion. This study was conducted by performing the Lee modified Fox-Montorsi heart-lung transplant on 25 San Diego Microsurgical Institute-bred Sprague Dawley rats that were subjected to left coronary artery ligation in each case. Of these 25 rats, a straight-porous (SP) needling procedure was applied to 9 heterotopically transplanted rat hearts, and a distinct horseshoe (HS)-shaped needle application was performed on the remaining 16 heterotopically transplanted rat hearts. This report represents an acute study on the efficiency of these two needles to transmit oxygen-rich blood from the left ventricle into the ischemic myocardium. Doppler readings for male vs. female transplants showed that the control peak (PK) and mean (MN) kHz values are on the average of 0.20 kHz higher in males than in females. However, control heart rate values in both sexes are approximately equal. Ligation of the left coronary artery caused a dramatic decrease of PK and MN kHz values in both sexes, while heart rate showed no significant decrease from the original control values in response to ischemia. Application of the SP needle showed only a slight return of PK and MN values in both sexes, but heart rate values increased to levels higher than the original control values. The HS needling procedure was able to recover approximately 80% of the control PK and MN kHz values in both sexes. Thus, these data indicate that the HS needle can successfully transmit left ventricular blood into the myocardium.