The cardioprotective effect of danshen and gegen decoction on rat hearts and cardiomyocytes with post-ischemia reperfusion injury

BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Kwok-Pui Fung¹  Kit-Man Lau³  Judy Yuet-Wa Chan³  Chi-Man Koon³  Fan Hu² 

[1] 509A, Lo Kwee-Seong Integrated Biomedical Sciences Building, Area 39, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong SAR, China;School of Biomedical Sciences, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong;Institute of Chinese Medicine, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong

关键词: Calcium;    Apoptosis;    Hypoxia and reoxygenation;    Ischemia and reperfusion;    Danshen and Gegen decoction;   

Others  :  1231417
DOI  :  10.1186/1472-6882-12-249

 received in 2012-03-26, accepted in 2012-11-30,  发布年份 2012

【 摘 要 】

Background

Danshen (Salviae Miltiorrhizae Radix) and Gegen (Puerariae Lobatae Radix) have been used for treating heart disease for several thousand years in China. It has been found that a Danshen and Gegen decoction (DG) exhibiting an anti-atherosclerosis effect, which improves the patients’ heart function recovery. Pre-treatment with DG was reported to have protective effects on myocardium against ischemia/reperfusion injury. In the present study, we aim to investigate the post-treatment effect of DG on ischemic-reperfusion injuries ex vivo or in vitro and the underlying mechanisms involved.

Methods

The rat heart function in an ischemia and reperfusion (I/R) model was explored by examining three parameters including contractile force, coronary flow rate and the release of heart specific enzymes within the heart perfusate. In vitro model of hypoxia and reoxygenation (H/R), the protective effect of DG on damaged cardiomyocytes was investigated by examining the cell structure integrity, the apoptosis and the functionality of mitochondria.

Results

Our results showed that DG significantly improved rat heart function after I/R challenge and suppressed the release of enzymes by damaged heart muscles in a dose-dependent manner. DG also significantly inhibited the death of cardiomyocytes, H9c2 cells, with a H/R challenge. It obviously decreased cell apoptosis, protected the mitochondrial function and cell membrane skeleton integrity on H9c2 cells. The cardio-protection was also found to be related to a decrease in intracellular calcium accumulation within H9c2 cells after I/R challenge.

Conclusion

The potential application of DG in treating rat hearts with an I/R injury has been implied in this study. Our results suggested that DG decoction could act as an anti-apoptotic and anti-ion stunning agent to protect hearts against an I/R injury.

【 授权许可】

   
2012 Hu et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

【 图 表 】

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