Antiarrhythmic effect of cardiac sympathectomy

The authors studied the effect of sympathetic denervation of the heart (removal of the stellate ganglion together with the sympathetic trunk up to the level of the 5th thoracic ganglion) on the ventricular fibrillation threshold (VFT) in dog. The acute experiments were performed under general anaesthesia with pentobarbital. Unilateral left sympathetic denervation raised the VFT to 144% of the initial value (14 measurements) and unilateral right sympathectomy to 214% (9 measurements). Immediately after bilateral denervation the VFT increased to 242% (23 observations). Atropine blockade of the vagus nerve (0.1 mg/kg b.w.) displayed no effect on the VFT increase. The observed increase in VFT corresponded with the finding that bilateral sympathetic denervation of the heart protected the dogs from spontaneous ventricular fibrillation after ligating the intraventricular branch of the left coronary artery. The authors compared their own results with those reported in the literature and discuss the possible clinical use of sympathetic denervation of the heart in the treatment of tachyarrhythmia.