The Articulo-Cardiac Sympathetic Reflex in Spinalized, Anesthetized Rats

Somatic afferent regulation of heart rate by noxious knee joint stimulation has been proven in anesthetized cats to be a reflex response whose reflex center is in the brain and whose efferent arc is a cardiac sympathetic nerve. In the present study we examined whether articular stimulation could inf...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of Physiological Sciences Vol. 56; no. 2; pp. 137 - 143
Main Authors Nakayama, Tomohiro, Suzuki, Atsuko, Ito, Ryuzo
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Japan PHYSIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF JAPAN 01.01.2006
The Physiological Society of Japan
BioMed Central
Subjects
Adrenalectomy
Anesthesia
Animals
articular stimulation
cardiac sympathetic nerve
Denervation
Efferent Pathways
Heart - innervation
Heart - physiology
Heart Rate
Joints - innervation
Male
Movement
rat
Rats
Rats, Wistar
Reflex - physiology
Spinal Cord - cytology
Spinal Cord - physiology
Spinal Cord Injuries
spinal reflex
Sympathetic Nervous System - cytology
Sympathetic Nervous System - physiology
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Summary:Somatic afferent regulation of heart rate by noxious knee joint stimulation has been proven in anesthetized cats to be a reflex response whose reflex center is in the brain and whose efferent arc is a cardiac sympathetic nerve. In the present study we examined whether articular stimulation could influence heart rate by this efferent sympathetic pathway in spinalized rats. In central nervous system (CNS)-intact rats, noxious articular movement of either the knee or elbow joint resulted in an increase in cardiac sympathetic nerve activity and heart rate. However, although in acutely spinalized rats a noxious movement of the elbow joint resulted in a significant increase in cardiac sympathetic nerve activity and heart rate, a noxious movement of the knee joint had no such effect and resulted in only a marginal increase in heart rate. Because this marginal increase was abolished by adrenalectomy suggests that it was due to the release of adrenal catecholamines. In conclusion, the spinal cord appears to be capable of mediating, by way of cardiac sympathetic nerves, the propriospinally induced reflex increase in heart rate that follows noxious stimulation of the elbow joint, but not the knee joint.
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ISSN:1880-6546
1880-6562
DOI:10.2170/physiolsci.RP000705