A study of experimental endocarditis in pigs

In a proposed study of fibrinolytic therapy in experimental streptococcal endocarditis, this disease was induced in pigs by preinoculation damage to the aortic valve; the technique of this is described. If untreated, the disease runs a protracted course, similar to that in man. Fibrinolytic activity, normally low in the pig, can be increased by stress, by urokinase, by plasmin and briefly by streptokinase if supplemented by human plasminogen. The proposed experiments were abandoned in pigs, chiefly because of technical difficulties in obtaining frequent samples of blood and maintaining infusions. In experiments on the response of ADP-induced aggregation of pig platelets to prostacyclin, they were found to be about 10 times more resistant than human platelets. It is suggested that this resistance to prostacyclin, together with their usually low state of systemic fibrinolytic activity, may explain the susceptibility of pigs to bacterial endocarditis.