Protective effects of ulinastatin against ischemia-reperfusion injury

Abstract We investigated the protective effect of urinary trypsin inhibitor (ulinastatin: UTI) in vitro, in relation to the neutrophil activity in hepatic ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury. The rat liver was removed and preserved in cold Ringer's lactate solution for 60 min, followed by 120 min of reperfusion with oxygenated perfusate. The rats were divided into four groups ( n = 8 in each group). The livers were perfused with Krebs–Henseleit (K-H) solution containing no additives in group 1, 50,000 U/kg of UTI in group 2, 3.5 × 10 6 of neutrophils in group 3, and both neutrophils and UTI in group 4. In group 3, the AST and ALT levels were always higher than those in other three groups at any point evaluated ( P P P P P in vitro by inhibiting of neutrophil accumulation in the postischemic liver.