Can intravenous atropine prevent bradycardia and hypotension during induction of total intravenous anesthesia with propofol and remifentanil?

This study was conducted to examine whether pretreatment with intravenous atropine could prevent bradycardia and hypotension during induction of total intravenous anesthesia with propofol and remifentanil in a prospective randomized placebo-controlled manner. Seventy patients, aged 24-78 years, were randomly divided into two groups, and received 0.5 mg atropine or placebo saline 1 min before induction of intravenous anesthesia with remifentanil at 0.4 microg/kg/min, propofol at a target blood concentration of 3 microg/ml, and vecuronium 1.5 mg/kg. Immediately after tracheal intubation, the infusion rate of remfentanil and the target concentration of propofol were reduced to and kept at 0.1 microg/kg/min and 2 microg/ml, respectively, for 10 min. Noninvasive blood pressure (BP) and heartrate (HR) were measured and recorded every minute. Intravenous atropine could prevent a fall in HR, but not a fall in BP, during induction of intravenous anesthesia with propofol and remifentanil of our dosing regimen. Our data suggested that a fall in HR induced by propofol-remifentanil anesthesia was mainly caused by centrally mediated sympatholytic and/or vagotonic actions of propofol and remifentanil, whereas a fall in BP was mainly the result of their direct vasodilating actions.