title: [Comparative study on early application of the recipe for activating blood circulation and the recipe for supplementing qi for inhibiting left ventricular remodeling and apoptosis in rats with heart failure].
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To compare the characteristics of early application of the recipe for activating blood circulation and the recipe for supplementing qi for inhibiting left ventricular remodeling and apoptosis in rats with heart failure.
  
  
  METHODS
  The left coronary artery occlusion was conducted to establish the rat model of heart failure after myocardial infarction. The model rats were randomly divided into 5 groups, including model group, activating blood circulation group (8 g x kg(-1)), supplementing qi group (8 g x kg(-1)), activating blood circulation plus supplementing qi group (16 g x kg(-1)), and captopril group (10.125 g x kg(-1)), and a sham operation group was set up as negative control group. The drugs were administrated on the second day after myocardial infarction with a therapeutic course of 4 weeks or 8 weeks. The heart function was detected by impedance method; Pathological staining and image analysis were used to determine the perimeter and the area of left ventricular cavity, and myocardial nuclei number and collagen content per unit area; Apoptosis percentage of the myocardial cell was detected by TUNEL and the content of Ang II in the cardiac muscle was measured by radioimmunoassay.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In comparison with the model group, the function of left ventricular contraction function improved, the area of left ventricular cavity diminished, and proliferation of collagen, content of Ang II and apoptosis percentage of the myocardial cell reduced in all of the treatment groups (P < 0.05 or P < 0.01). After treatment of 8 weeks, the activating blood circulation group was similar to the sham operation group in improvement of cardiac index, and decreases of the area of left ventricular cavity and the content of Ang II; Apoptosis percentage of the myocardial cell in the activating blood circulation group was significantly lower than that in the supplementing qi group.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Both the recipes for activating blood circulation and for supplementing qi can inhibit left ventricular remodeling and myocardial apoptosis, and delay development of heart failure, with the best effect in the activating blood circulation group after treatment of 8 weeks.
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Chinese Internal Medicine, Ministry of Education/Laboratory for Research on the Theory of Qi-Blood, Dongzhimen Hospital Affiliated to Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing 100700, China.
authors.forename: Ming-jing
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: Shuo-ren
authors.initials: SR
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Min
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Zhen-tao
authors.initials: ZT
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Ling-qun
authors.initials: LQ
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Cui
authors.forename: Xi-ying
authors.initials: XY
authors.lastname: Lu
mesh_terms: D000804:Angiotensin II / Q000378:metabolism; D000818:Animals; D017209:Apoptosis / Q000187:drug effects*; D027885:Astragalus propinquus / Q000737:chemistry; D004338:Drug Combinations; D004365:Drugs, Chinese Herbal / Q000302:isolation & purification / Q000494:pharmacology*; D006333:Heart Failure / Q000209:etiology / Q000378:metabolism / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008297:Male; D009203:Myocardial Infarction / Q000150:complications; D009206:Myocardium / Q000378:metabolism; D032383:Myocytes, Cardiac / Q000187:drug effects / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology; D010946:Plants, Medicinal / Q000737:chemistry; D019413:Qi; D011897:Random Allocation; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D027561:Salvia miltiorrhiza / Q000737:chemistry; D020257:Ventricular Remodeling / Q000187:drug effects*
chemical_list: D004338:Drug Combinations; D004365:Drugs, Chinese Herbal; D000804:Angiotensin II