The effects of benfotiamin in experimental acute myocardial infarction

ABSTRACT THE EFFECTS OF BENFOTIAMIN IN EXPERIMENTAL ACUTE MYOCARDIAL INFARCTION Myocardial Infarction (MI) is a group of diseases that cause the most deaths in cardiovascular diseases. Isoproterenol (ISO), is a -adrenergic agent that commonly used for creating the experimental acute myocardial infarction model. Benfotiamin is fat-soluble form of vitamin B1 and known to have antioxidant effects. In this study, we aimed to investigate the effects of benfotiamin, that has antioxidant properties, on heart tissue of rats with experimental acute myocardial infarction induced by ISO. In the study, 8 week-age, 24 male Wistar rats were used. Animals were divided into 4 different groups with 6 animals in each group. The control group (Group I) was without any application during the 14 days-experiment period. In benfotiamin (group II) group benfotiamin was given orally at a dose of 70mg/kg/day. In both MI (group III), and MI + benfotiamin (group IV) groups 150 mg / kg intraperitoneal isoproterenol was administered 2 times with 24 hours interval and after this application no other application was administered to MI group but on the other hand 70mg/kg/day benfotiamin was given orally to MI + benfotiamin group. At the end of the experiment, all rats were decapitated, and heart tissues were removed under anaesthesia. Heart tissues were evaluated immunohistochemically with Haematoxylin & eosin, Masson's trichrome, Bax and caspase 3 and TUNEL staining was performed. Immunohistochemical staining revealed a marked increase in bax and caspase 3 immunoreactivity in MI group in comparison with the control and benfotiamin groups and decrease was observed in MI + benfotiamin group. TUNEL staining revealed increased apoptotic cells in MI group in comparison with the control and benfotiamin groups and a reduction was observed in MI + benfotiamin group. As a result, we observed the protective effects of benfotiamin against the cellular changes in experimental acute myocardial infarction and so benfotiamin may be a useful approch to challenge for MI associated complications. Key Words: Myocardial infarction, benfotiamin, isoproterenol