Establishment of an animal model of ischemic type intrahepatic biliary lesion in rabbits

AIM： To explore a method to establish an animal model of ischemic type intrahepatic biliary lesion in rabbits. METHODS： Forty Japanese white rabbits of clean grade were divided randomly into four groups （10 rabbits per group） including sham operation （SO） group, and artery-bile obstruction （ABO）-1 h group, ABO-2 h group and ABO-3 h group. All the rabbits in this study underwent the same initial surgical procedure in which the liver was prepared as for graft removal during liver transplantation. Subsequently in the SO group, no additional vascular intervention was performed, while in groups ABO-1 h, ABO-2 h and ABO-3 h, the animals underwent combined clamping of the hepatic artery and common bile duct with microvascular clips for 1, 2 and 3 h, respectively. After the scheduled occlusion time, the clip was removed to recover blood supply. The animals were killed 4 wk after operation. The survival rate, liver function, cholangiography and histopathological manifestation of the rabbits in each group were observed. RESULTS： The survival rate was 100% in groups SO, ABO-1 h and ABO-2 h, while it was 60% in group ABO-3 h. At each observation time, the change degree of the indexes of liver function was proportional to the clamping time （ABO-3 h 〉 ABO-2 h 〉 ABO-1 h 〉 SO, P 〈 0.05）. Cholangiographical and histopathologic manifestations both showed that intrahepatic biliary lesion aggravated proportionally with the increase of the clamping time. CONCLUSION： An animal model of ischemic type intrahepatic biliary lesion in rabbits is successfully established, which may provide a reliable technique for basic and clinical research into the etiology, development and prophylaxis of ischemic type intrahepatic biliary lesion after liver transplantation.