Chronic mild restraint protects the rat gastric mucosa from injury by ethanol or cold restraint.

The effects of chronic mild restraint on the susceptibility of the rat gastric mucosa to ethanol or cold-restraint injury were studied. Gastric mucosas of animals subjected to chronic mild restraint exhibited less damage when bathed with 40% ethanol than those of control animals. This reduced damage was observed with 2 days of mild restraint and was maximal (93% less damage; p less than 0.0005) when the animal was mildly restrained for 10 days. Pretreatment with indomethacin abolished the protection afforded by chronic mild restraint, suggesting a mechanism involving endogenous prostaglandin synthesis. Chronic mild restraint significantly (p less than 0.05) reduced the injury to the gastric mucosa caused by cold-restraint stress. This model of mild restraint may prove useful in future studies on the mechanism of stress-induced and other gastric mucosal lesions.