Physiological and pharmacological studies on isolated human bronchial preparations.

The contractile response of human bronchial smooth muscle preparations obtained after death (necrobronchi) from 15 patients was studied in vitro. Reproduceable responses sufficient for calculating dose-response curves, could be obtained up to 30 h after death. A number of smooth muscle stimulants were investigated: 1) carbacholine, 2) acetylcholine, 3) histamine and 4) electrical field stimulation. In addition to these bronchial smooth muscle relaxants such as adrenaline, salbutamol and terbutaline were also studied. These agents showed a dose-dependent relaxation in preparations previously treated with carbacholine. It can be concluded that in vitro testing of smooth muscle preparations obtained from human cadavers is possible.