[HSF] Another on vs off pump question, dilatation of IMA......

[Jbflegejr at aol.com]

Don, you and others have said that you clamp and divide the IMA and lay it  
aside until time for the anastomosis, some with it wrapped in a sponge soaked  
with papaverine and/or verapamil, some after injecting the same drugs into the 
 lumen, and later found the IMA to be plump and pulsating. Perhaps there is  
another explanation. When you open the IMA after it has been clamped for some  
time, the blood in the lumen is dark, desaturated, meaning that the oxygen 
has  been extracted, which must mean that the vessel wall has been ischemic. 
Could it  be that when the smooth muscle cells become ischemic, they lose there 
capacity  to contract and the vessel wall relaxes and dilates and the drugs 
have nothing  to do with it? John Flege



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