Abstract: OBJECTIVE To investigated the effect of oxymatrine(OMT) on apoptosis and its protein Bcl-2 and Bax of myocardium in mice with viral myocarditis. METHODS BALB/c mice were used and inoculated intraperitoneally with CVB3. Twenty-four hours after the last inoculation with CVB3, the infected mice were intraperitoneally injected with OMT or ribavirin. The mice were divided into normal control group(NC), viral myocarditis model group(VM), OMT high, middle, low and extreme low group(OMT-H, OMT-M, OMT-L, OMT-EL. the dose were 25, 12.5, 6.25, 3.125 mg·kg^-1·d^-1, respectively.)and ribavirin group(RB, 100 mg·kg^-1·day^-1). six mice from each group were sacrificed and their myocardial tissues were obtained after 12 d. The myocardial cells apoptosis were detected through TUNEL assay, and the protein expression of Bcl-2 and Bax were detected using western blot and immunohistochemical method. RESULTS OMT induced myocardial cells apoptosis in viral myocarditis mice, compared with VM, the effect of OMT-L was remarkable (P<0.01). The protein expression of Bax was decreased in OMT treatment groups, but the protein expression of Bcl-2 was unchanged after OMT treatment. CONCLUSION OMT may reduce myocardial cells apoptosis in viral myocarditis mice, and it is related to regulating Bax protein in vivo.