Experimental Nonocclusive Mesenteric Ischemia

Abstract

NONOCCLUSIVE mesenteric infarction is a clinical state of increasing incidence and surgical significance.¹ In the classic case an elderly patient with atherosclerotic heart disease sustains an acute stress such as an infection or a surgical procedure. The increased circulatory demand cannot be met, and so splanchnic vasoconstriction occurs and causes intestinal mucosal damage. This produces a series of events which ends in a low-flow state with hypovolemia, sepsis, perhaps edotoxemia, and myocardial failure. To date, therapy has seldom prevented a fatal outcome and some have suggested² that "only serendipity can provide us with effective treatment." Therefore, an experimental model on which therapy could be evaluated would have significance. This report presents data from an experimental model which simulated the clinical disease nonocclusive mesenteric ischemia. Methods All experimental studies were done on mongrel dogs of both sexes weighing between 8 and 25 kg (18 and 56 lb) and were