The Research Of Continuous Perfusion With Oxygenated Blood For Donor Heart Preservation

Objective: Heart transplantation was considered as the first choice for the treatment of end-stage heart failure. Machine perfusion provides an opportunity to preserve the donor heart and assesses myocardial function. A new machine perfusion system is constructed and used to evaluate the effect of the preserved heart in the beating state during long-term storage.Methods: Chinese mini-swine(N=16) were randomly divided into HTK, Celsior and Heartbeat groups. All donor hearts were respectively preserved for 8 hours under the help of cold storage or machine perfusion. The perfusion solution is adjust to maintain its homeostasis based on monitoring the Heartbeat group.Results: The ultrastructure of myocardium shows normality in the Heartbeat group. Compared with HTK or Celsior-preserved hearts, the myocardial and coronary artery structural and functional integrity of hearts were determined by immunofluorescence and western blots in the Heartbeat. Donor hearts stored in the Heartbeat maintained a high adenosine triphosphate level. The Bcl-2 and Beclin-1 protein demonstrate high expression in Celsior group.Conclusions: We provide evidence that Heartbeat system can be used to preserve donor hearts, and it could guarantee the myocardial and endothelia function of hearts during machine perfusion. Translating Heartbeat into clinical practice, it is likely to impact on donor heart preservation for cardiac transplantation.