An experimental assessment of macroscopic enzyme techniques for the autopsy demonstration of myocardial infarction

Abstract

Experimental cardiac infarction produced in dogs by coronary artery ligation was used to study the value of macroscopic histochemical enzyme loss in the diagnosis of myocardial infarction at autopsy. Creative phosphokinase and non-specific dehydrogenase methods gave the best results but became positive only 5-6 h after infarction. Apparently the method is of limited value in autopsy practice.