Improvement of cardiac hypertrophy model induced by abdominal aortic coarctation in rats

Objective: To optimize the cardiac hypertrophy model induced by abdominal aortic coarctation in rats. Methods: Using left side direct entering approach, the hypertensive hypertrophy was induced with abdominal aortic coarctation in rats. The tail artery blood pressure was measured dynamically before and after operation. At the end of the experiment of 4 weeks,carotid and left ventricular pressures,cardiac and hypertrophy coefficient were measured. The hearts were observed histologically. Results: Compared with sham-operated animals,the tail artery blood pressure in operated rats increased by 29%（P ＜0.01） two weeks after operation. By four weeks,carotid blood pressure and left ventricular pressure of the operated group increased 28% （P ＜0.01）and 36% （P ＜0.01）,respectively. Cardiac coefficient （heart weight/body weight） and cardiac hypertrophy coefficient（left ventricle weight/heart weight） increased 0.86 （P ＜0.01） and 0.89 （P ＜0.01） respectively,compared with sham-operated rats. The histological slices showed hypertrophied cardiac myocytes. Conclusion: The left side direct entering approach can reliably duplicate hypertensive hypertrophy model in rats with high repeatability and success rate.