Performance of the hypertrophied left ventricle in spontaneously hypertensive rat. Effects of changes in preload and afterload.

Isolated hearts from adult spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR; Okamoto 1969), with established hypertension, were investigated in an antegrade perfusion apparatus where preload and afterload could be varied independently. Frank-Starling curves were constructed at constant afterloads ranging from 50 mmHg to 150 mmHg. As earlier reported, the SHR hearts exhibited a rightward shift of their Frank-Startling relationships compared to those from the normotensive control hearts, though visible only at afterloads up to about 100 mmHg. At higher afterloads the SHR hearts performed significantly better then the NCR ones as their maximal stroke volume was significantly greater compared to that of controls. Thus, left ventricular hypertrophy obviously increases the work capacity of the heart, though at the cost of an altered Frank-Startling relation dependent on the reduced diastolic compliance. For such reasons the myocardial hypertrophy in established SHR hypertension must be considered a physiologic adaptation and not a degenerative phenomenon, though naturally degenerative processes may later become superimposed.