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The influence of chronic stellectomy on external carotid flow responses to i.a. serotonin (5HT) was determined in dogs in which both stellate ganglia had been removed 1, 2, 4 or 8 weeks previously. The effect of this maneuver on carotid and heart rate responses to i.a. and i.v. norepinephrine (NE), respectively, was also assessed for comparison. Constrictor responses to NE in the carotid were moderately increased at 2 and 4 weeks, while its positive chronotropic effects were markedly augmented throughout the observation period. Dilator responses to 5HT increased at 4 and specially at 8 weeks after stellectomy. Results obtained with NE were considered compatible with supersensitivity induced by decentralization in the carotid and by denervation in the heart. Changes in carotid responses to 5HT were interpreted as being due to a prejunctional mechanism similar to that responsible for supersensitivity to NE. Differences in the time course of development of supersensitivity to both amines were attributed to masking of 5HT dilatation by NE released by the indoleamine at the time of increased sensitivity to constriction by the catecholamine.

In order to explore the postulated role of prostaglandins in the vasodilator effects of hydralazine, blood pressure and heart rate responses to the drug were determined in anesthetized and conscious rats with and without pretreatment with indomethacin or aspirin. Changes in rectal temperature were also measured. In control animals, hydralazine produced an almost immediate fall in blood pressure and a slowly developing tachycardia which bore no temporal relation with the hypotension. These effects were accompanied by a moderate increase in temperature. Pretreatment with the cyclo-oxygenase inhibitors did not reduce the blood pressure response, but completely blocked and in some cases reversed the tachycardia. The hyperthermic response was also reversed. These results can be taken as evidence for a role of prostaglandins in the tachycardia and hyperthermia, but not in the hypotension elicited by hydralazine in rats. In the absence of direct measurements of prostaglandin synthesis and release, however, no firm support for this possibility is offered by the present findings and alternative explanations are considered.

The role of the sympatho-adrenal system in the production of tachycardia accompanying the hypotensive response to hydralazine was studied in urethane-anesthetized rats subjected to previous bilateral adrenal demedullation or to pretreatment with 6-hydroxydopamine and compared with intact control animals. The prolonged hypotension induced by the vasodilator was not affected by these maneuvers, but the slowly developing tachycardia was reversed to bradycardia, which in the demedullated group was followed after 60 min by a moderate increase in heart rate. In the chemically sympathectomized rats, the cardiac depressant response was completely blocked by pretreatment with atropine. In additional experiments, previous administration of methylatropine enhanced hydralazine tachycardia, but atropine partially inhibited this response and changed its time course to mirror that of the hypotension. These results indicate that in urethane-anesthetized rats, hydralazine tachycardia is mediated by sympatho-adrenal activation and that it is accompanied by a simultaneous heart rate-lowering parasympathetic discharge normally masked by the predominant tachycardia. They further suggest that the tachycardia is facilitated by a muscarinic mechanism which modulates central sympathetic influences on cardiovascular function.

The influence of inhalation of near lethal quantities of toluene on some ECG parameters, as well as the possible cardiac sensitizing effect of the solvent, were determined in chloralose-anesthetized rats. These actions were compared with those of its close analogue benzene. Both solvents produced tachycardia; toluene increased the duration of QRS and specially PR, while benzene decreased P wave duration. No other systematic changes in ECG morphology or evidence of arrhythmia were observed. Toluene appeared to decrease the number of ectopic beats induced by epinephrine, in contrast to benzene, which increased it markedly. These results suggest that toluene administered by inhalation up to near lethal doses is devoid of untoward ECG effect in the chloralose-anesthetized rat, its only action being a decrease in intraventricular and particularly AV conduction. It does not share the myocardial sensitizing properties of benzene and in fact appears to elicit some protection from the arrhythmogenic effects of epinephrine, although no definite conclusions as to this action can be derived due to limitations in the experimental model used.

The normal cardiovascular response to hydralazine in urethane-anesthetized rats, i.e. hypotension and tachycardia, was changed to hypotension and bradycardia if the body temperature of the animals was not maintained constant by external heating, but was allowed to decrease spontaneously throughout the experiment. A similar phenomenon was observed with diazoxide. In rats maintained at a rectal temperature of 31 degrees C, hydralazine bradycardia was partially blocked by a low dose of atropine and was reversed to tachycardia by a high dose of this agent; mecamylamine failed to influence heart rate lowering in this condition. Heart rate responses in unheated animals to acetylcholine and isopropylarterenol were respectively potentiated and depressed when compared to responses in heated rats. These findings suggest that cold-induced reciprocal changes in reactivity of cardiac muscarinic and beta-adrenoceptors may be responsible for reversal of hydralazine or diazoxide tachycardia in urethane-anesthetized hypothermic rats. As a result, cardiac stimulation by the sympatho-adrenal discharge induced by hypotension is inhibited, while cardiac depression which is apparently also induced by hypotension, is facilitated. It is speculated that vasopressin, released as a consequence of the blood pressure fall, could be this negative chronotropic factor.