Myocardial cell damage due to ethanol.

The effect of ethanol on the myocardial metabolism of experimental animals was studied in acute and in chronic models. Thirty minutes after intraperitoneal injection of ethanol in a dose of 250 mg/100 gm of body weight there was a significant increase of glycolysis and slight decrease of mitochondrial respiration as well as of respiratory control ratio. No changes were observed in the concentration of high energy phosphates in the heart muscle. The metabolic changes in these acute experiments were of a transitory character; they disappeared parallel with the decline of ethanol level in the blood and in the myocardium. The chronic alcoholic model was observed for 10 weeks. Ethanol (250 mg/100 gm) was injected daily. The analyses of the heart muscle were carried out 24 hr after the last injection of ethanol. In this model ethanol also provoked considerable disturbances of metabolic processes in the myocardium: decrease of glycolysis and of glycogen content, decrease of mitochondrial respiration as well as of respiratory control ratio of isolated mitochondria and decrease of adenosine triphosphate and creatine phosphate with simultaneous increase of inorganic phosphate in the myocardium.