Effects And Mechanism Of Erythromycin On Acute Paraquat Intoxication Induced Lung Injury

Backgroud and objective: Severe paraquat intoxication is characterized by multipleorgan failure, involving mainly the lungs, kidneys and livers. The lung is a major target organ in paraquat poisoning, and respiratory failure from lung injury is the most common cause of death. There is no spesific antidote for paraquat intoxication, which has the higher mortality rate. Endothelial expression of intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM-1) has been shown to be a major regulator of lung inflammation in various experimental models, which may be important molecule elements in progress of acute lung injury. Erythromycin, a macrolide antibiotic, is widely used as an anti-infective agent, it may play an an-tiinflammatory role. Thus, erythromycin may improve chronic lung inflammation by affecting polymorphonuclear neutrophil(PMN) action directly or indirectly. However, there has been almost no study ofthe effect of erythromycin on the lung injury induced by paraquat intoxication.Weaimed to investigate whether erythromycin could affect paraquat intoxication induced acute pulmonary injury of rats and its probable mechanism, which may offer theoretic base for clinical therapy.