Department of Internal Medicine I - Cardiology, University Hospital Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany ; Comprehensive Heart Failure Center, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany.
PLoS One. 2013 Aug 21;8(8):e68275. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0068275. eCollection 2013.
Surgical procedures in small animal models of heart disease might evoke alterations in cardiac morphology and function. The aim of this study was to reveal and quantify such potential artificial early or long term effects in vivo, which might account for a significant bias in basic cardiovascular research, and, therefore, could potentially question the meaning of respective studies.
Female Wistar rats (n = 6 per group) were matched for weight and assorted for sham left coronary artery ligation or control. Cardiac morphology and function was then investigated in vivo by cine magnetic resonance imaging at 7 Tesla 1 and 8 weeks after the surgical procedure. The time course of metabolic and inflammatory blood parameters was determined in addition.
Compared to healthy controls, rats after sham surgery showed a lower body weight both 1 week (267.5±10.6 vs. 317.0±11.3 g, n<0.05) and 8 weeks (317.0±21.1 vs. 358.7±22.4 g, n<0.05) after the intervention. Left and right ventricular morphology and function were not different in absolute measures in both groups 1 week after surgery. However, there was a confined difference in several cardiac parameters normalized to the body weight (bw), such as myocardial mass (2.19±0.30/0.83±0.13 vs. 1.85±0.22/0.70±0.07 mg left/right per g bw, p<0.05), or enddiastolic ventricular volume (1.31±0.36/1.21±0.31 vs. 1.14±0.20/1.07±0.17 µl left/right per g bw, p<0.05). Vice versa, after 8 weeks, cardiac masses, volumes, and output showed a trend for lower values in sham operated rats compared to controls in absolute measures (782.2±57.2/260.2±33.2 vs. 805.9±84.8/310.4±48.5 mg, p<0.05 for left/right ventricular mass), but not normalized to body weight. Matching these findings, blood testing revealed only minor inflammatory but prolonged metabolic changes after surgery not related to cardiac disease.
Cardio-thoracic surgical procedures in experimental myocardial infarction cause distinct alterations upon the global integrity of the organism, which in the long term also induce circumscribed repercussions on cardiac morphology and function. This impact has to be considered when analyzing data from respective animal studies and transferring these findings to conditions in patients.
心脏病小动物模型中的手术操作可能会引起心脏形态和功能的改变。本研究的目的是揭示和量化这种潜在的人工早期或长期影响，这可能会导致基础心血管研究中出现显著的偏倚，因此可能会对相关研究的意义提出质疑。
将 6 只雌性 Wistar 大鼠（每组 6 只）按体重匹配，并分为假左冠状动脉结扎组或对照组。术后 1 周和 8 周时，通过 7 特斯拉磁共振成像对心脏形态和功能进行活体研究。此外，还测定了代谢和炎症血液参数的时间过程。
与健康对照组相比，假手术组大鼠术后 1 周（267.5±10.6 比 317.0±11.3 g，n<0.05）和 8 周（317.0±21.1 比 358.7±22.4 g，n<0.05）的体重均较低。术后 1 周时，两组的左、右心室形态和功能在绝对值上无差异。然而，在一些与体重（bw）相关的心脏参数上存在差异，如心肌质量（2.19±0.30/0.83±0.13 比 1.85±0.22/0.70±0.07 mg 左/右 per g bw，p<0.05）或舒张末期心室容积（1.31±0.36/1.21±0.31 比 1.14±0.20/1.07±0.17 µl 左/右 per g bw，p<0.05）。相反，8 周后，与对照组相比，假手术组的心脏质量、体积和输出在绝对值上有较低的趋势（782.2±57.2/260.2±33.2 比 805.9±84.8/310.4±48.5 mg，左/右心室质量 p<0.05），但与体重无关。与这些发现相匹配，血液检测仅显示手术后轻微的炎症变化，但代谢变化持续时间较长，与心脏病无关。
实验性心肌梗死中的心胸外科手术操作会对整个机体的完整性产生明显的影响，长期来看也会对心脏形态和功能产生局限性的影响。在分析相关动物研究的数据并将这些发现转移到患者的情况时，必须考虑到这一影响。
