Abstract
We used cinnamophilin, a novel dual inhibitor of thromboxane synthase and thromboxane A <sub>2</sub> (TXA <sub>2</sub> ) receptor, and superoxide dismutase (SOD) with catalase to examine their protective effect against reperfusion injury in rat skeletal muscle. In 5 groups of 6 Wistar rats three hours of ischaemia were induced in one hind limb by application of a tourniquet to the proximal thigh; the contralateral limb served as an internal, nonischaemic control. The first group did not receive any drug nor was it reperfused. In the other four groups, normal saline (reperfusion control), dimethylsulphoxide (DMSO), cinnamophilin, or SOD with catalase was given before removal of the tourniquet and one hour of reperfusion followed. Skeletal muscle injury was measured by a quantitative spectrophotometric assay of triphenyltetrazolium chloride (TTC) reduction and by muscle weight gain. One hour of reperfusion significantly (p < 0.05) lowered TTC reduction in ischaemic limbs in the reperfusion control group in comparison with the rats with 3h ischaemia alone. Among the four reperfusion groups, only the cinnamophilin group had significantly lower decrease of TTC reduction and significantly lower muscle weight gain. These results demonstrate the protective effect of cinnamophilin against reperfusion injury of the ischaemic skeletal muscle in rats.