Effect of Remifentanil Preconditioning in Different Concentrations on Hepatic Hypoxia-reoxygenation Injury

OBJECTIVE To investigate different remifentanil concentrations used to pretreat hepatocytes undergone hypoxia-reoxygenation injury to find out the proper concentration against hypoxia-reoxygenation injury. METHODS Hepatocytes HL7702 were cultured in vitro, and invided into eleven groups: control group(group N), hypoxia-reoxygenation group(group IR), remifentanil preconditioning groups (group RE1-RE8) and normal saline group(group NS) were administered one hour before hepatocyte hypoxia-reoxygenation injury at different concentrations of 0.5, 1, 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 ng·mL^-1 and normal saline respectively. Then 8 hours of hypoxia and 4 hours of reoxygenation were followed in the group IR, group NS and the preconditioning groups, while the group N was cultured in normal condition. Cell viability, ALT, AST, LDH and intracellular MDA were measured. RESULTS Compared with group N, cell viability reduced, AST, LDH and intracellular MDA increased in other groups (P<0.05). Compared with group IR and group NS respectively, cell viability increased, AST, LDH and intracellular MDA reduced in groups RE2-RE6 (P<0.05), however, no differences were shown among group RE1, RE7 and RE8 (P>0.05). CONCLUSION Remifentanil preconditioning protects against hypoxia-reoxygenation injury in human hepatocyte. The range of effective concentration is among 1-30 ng·mL^-1, which is in accordance with the clinically effective concentration in anesthesia, while the concentration out of the range shows no protection.