Effect of epigallocatechin gallate on cardiomyocyte apoptosis induced by ischemia-reperfusion in rats

AIM: To observe the effects of epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) on cardiomyocyte apoptosis induced by ischemia - reperfusion (IR) in rats. METHODS: The left anterior descending branch of coronary artery was ligated for 30 min and reperfused for 60 min to make a the myocardial ischemia - reperfusion model in rats. The experiment was divided into five groups: sham, ischemia/reperfusion (IR), EGCG (10 mg/kg and 20 mg/kg) and salvia miltiorrhizae (SM, 100 mg/kg) group. The apop-totic cardiomyocytes were detected by in situ end labeling method, and the expressions of Bcl - 2 and Bax were shown through im-munohistochemistry method. RESULTS: There was no apoptosis myocardial cell in sham operation group. The apoptosis index and expression of bax significantly increased, and bcl - 2/bax reduced in IR group ( P 0.01). In EGCG - treated group, however, the changes above were obviously alleviated ( P 0.01). CONCLUSION: EGCG significantly inhibits cardiomyocyte apoptosis in ischemia - reperfusion rat hearts. The possible mechanism is to raise the ratio of Bcl - 2/Bax proteins by increasing in the expression of bcl - 2 gene and decreasing in the expression of bax gene.