[Methods of anesthesia in canine heart-lung transplants]

Hypothermia has many valuable merits compared with under cardiopulmonary bypass using pump oxygenator, as known. But, on the contrary, it has some weak points, such as, long time required for cooling and rewarming. We have developed the device for rapid cooling and rewarming by using jet water blows. It appeared that the key point in hypothermia was control of ether inhalation and timing of rewarming. We demonstrated that mongrel dog could survive for at least 72 hours after transplantation of heart-lung under simple deep hypothermia with ether anesthesia. The dog was breathing 50-100 percent oxygen gas under control through respiratory ventilator. Postoperative arterial blood gases were maintained between pH 7.3-7.5 and PO2 80-200mmHg on the other hand, PCO2 was unstable from 14 to 63mmHg. It seemed that the anesthesia in canine heart-lung transplants using profound surface hypothermia with either anesthesia was useful methods.