Biochemical and histopathological comparison of the effects of renal artery vein clamping and renal artery clamping only during partial nephrectomy in rats with solitary kidney

Introduction and Objective: The standard surgical treatment of renal masses is radical nephrectomy (RN) or partial nephrectomy (PN). PN is performed with (vascular clamping) or without ischemia. In the literature, the superiority of artery only (AO) clamping over artery-vein (AV) clamping has been investigated. We aimed to investigate whether AO clamping or AV clamping is superior by performing an animal experiment. Materials and Methods: A total of 24 animals were divided into 3 groups: Control (K) group, artery only (AO) group and artery-vein (AV) group. All rats underwent right nephrectomy first. Then, left nephrectomy was performed 6 days later in the control group, left PN was performed 3 days later in the AO group by clamping the AO, and left PN was performed 3 days later in the AV group by clamping the AV. Inflammatory, oxidant, antioxidant markers and histopathologic examinations were compared between the groups. Chi-square test or Fisher's test was used to compare categorical variables, Kruskal Wallis test was used to compare continuous measurements and Mann Whitney U Test was used for post-hoc comparisons. Results: There was no statistically significant difference between the groups in terms of biochemical measurements. Bowman's capsule enlargement, tubular necrosis, tubular regeneration, mitosis, interstitial inflammation and tubular dilatation were not statistically different between Group AO and Group AV. Conclusions: This study demonstrated that AO and AV clamping yielded similar results. According to the current situation, the decision of the appropriateness of AO or AV clamping should be left to the surgeon.