Erythropoietin pretreatment alleviates intestinal ischemia reperfusion injury by antiapoptosis effect

Objective To discuss the effect and potential mechanism of EPO on intestinal ischemia reperfusion injury.Methods 24 male SD rats were randomly allocated into 3 groups:Sham operation group(Sham group,n =8),intestinal ischemia reperfusion injury group(IRI group,n =8),and EPO pretreatment group(EPO group,n =8).Rats in IRI group and Sham group were pretreated with saline(5 000 U/kg,i.p.) at 1 h before operation while rats in EPO group received EPO(5 000 U/kg,i.p.).Rats in IRI group and EPO group were kept in 32 ℃ infant incubators for 45 min after clamping the superior mesenteric artery(SMA),then the clamp was removed for reperfusion.Rats in sham group underwent the same process,except for clamping SMA.The rats were sacrificed after 1 h of reperfusion.Blood samples and intestinal tissues were collected.The pathology of intestinal tissues was observed according to HE staining,the protein levels of EPOR,p-EPOR,JAK2,p-JAK2,p-STAT3,STAT3,Bax,Cleavage-easpase3,Bcl-2and Caspase3 were measured by Western blot.Results Compared with sham group,the intestinal histology change,the protein expression level of p-EPOR p-JAK2,p-STAT3,Bax and Cleavage-caspase3 in IRI group increased significantly(P 0.05),while the expression of Bcl-2 and Caspase3 decreased(P 0.05).Compared with IRI group,the intestinal histology change,the protein expression level of Cleavage-caspase3 in EPO group decreased significantly(P 0.05),while the p-EPOR p-JAK2,p-STAT3,Bcl-2 and Caspase3 increased(P 0.05).Conclusion EPO pretreatment could inhibit the apoptosis to improve the intestinal ischemia reperfusion injury by inducing the activation of JAK2/STAT_3signal pathway.