Lidocaine as a protective agent during pancreas cold ischemia

Pancreatic islet transplantation in humans is a promising alternative for substitutive insulin therapy of IDDM (Insulin Dependent Diabetes Mellitus). Storage of harvested organs is a one of the most important factors, which influence efficacy of islet isolation process. In this sense, appropriate pancreas storage is the main point the successful pancreatic islet isolation. The purpose of the present study was to find out whether lidocaine, a well known membrane stabilizer and PLA2 (phospholipase A2) inhibitor could be applied in pancreas preservation for protection of endo- and exocrine pancreatic tissue from cells damage which occurs during and after storage. For this purpose, the effects of lidocaine on 1) viability and 2) endocrine function of pancreatic islets, isolated from pancreases exposed to cold ischemia, were investigated in this study. Our study showed hat lidocaine, injected intraductally before pancreas harvesting, improves efficacy of islet isolation. We found that the yields of islets in the groups treated with lidocaine were significantly higher when compared with controls. Glucose challenge test performed on these islets indicated that after the treatment with lidocaine, islets were more sensitive to glucose stimulation when compared with control islets, although the metabolic activity estimated by MTT test was comparable in both groups. In summary, donor pretreatment with lidocaine seems to be the safe method of protection of preserved pancreases from cell damage, caused by membranes destruction during cold ischemia.