Critical care medicine
-
Critical care medicine · Nov 2008
Intravenous infusion of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells improves brain function after resuscitation from cardiac arrest.
Allogeneic bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells were previously shown to improve myocardial function when administered intravenously after resuscitation from cardiac arrest in rats. Coincidental evidence of improved brain function prompted the present study. ⋯ Mesenchymal stem cells injected into the right atrium of rats after resuscitation from cardiac arrest were identified in brains harvested 35 days later. Brain function was significantly improved. Accordingly, venous injection of mesenchymal stem cells after cardiopulmonary resuscitation has promise of minimizing the severity of postresuscitation neurologic impairment.
-
Critical care medicine · Nov 2008
A comparison between head cooling begun during cardiopulmonary resuscitation and surface cooling after resuscitation in a pig model of cardiac arrest.
Employing transnasal head-cooling in a pig model of prolonged ventricular fibrillation, we compared the effects of 4 hrs of head-cooling started during cardiopulmonary resuscitation with those of 8 hrs of surface-cooling started at 2 hrs after resuscitation on 96-hr survival and neurologic outcomes. ⋯ Early head-cooling during cardiopulmonary resuscitation continuing for 4 hrs after resuscitation produced favorable survival and neurologic outcomes in comparison with delayed surface-cooling of 8 hrs duration.
-
Critical care medicine · Nov 2008
High-energy defibrillation impairs myocyte contractility and intracellular calcium dynamics.
We examined the effects of energy delivered with electrical defibrillation on myocyte contractility and intracellular Ca2+ dynamics. We hypothesized that increasing the defibrillation energy would produce correspondent reduction in myocyte contractility and intracellular Ca2+ dynamics. ⋯ Higher defibrillation energy significantly impairs ventricular contractility at the myocyte level. Reductions in cardiomyocyte shortening and intracellular Ca2+ dynamics abnormalities were greater when higher energy shock was used.