Protective Effect of Heparin on Blood Antioxidant Enzyme Activities in Ischaemic-Reperfusion Injury of The Rat Testicle

Background: Testicular torsion is an urologic emergency that causes testicular damage and lead to reduced fertility or infertil-ity. It appears that the main pathophysiology of testicular tor-sion is ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury of the testis caused by the twisted spermatic cord and its release. Surgical detorsion is currently the only treatment and allows blood reperfusion. These ischemia-reperfusion injuries are associated with over production of reactive oxygen species (ROS). Many antioxi-dants and free radical scavengers have been proposed in recent years for treatment of testicular torsion-induced male infertility. Heparin is a naturally occurring anticoagulant produced by ba-sophils and mast cells.Materials and Methods: Eighteen Wistar Albino male rats weighing 250–300 g were divided into three groups: sham (group S, n = 6); torsion/detorsion (group T/DT, n = 6), and heparin pretreatment (group Hep, n = 6). The left testes were rotated 720° clockwise for 2 hours in the rats of the torsion– detorsion group (group T/DT). Rats in the treatment group un-derwent the same surgical procedure as the torsion–detorsion group but were also given heparin 800 IU/kg (Hep group) by an intraperitoneal route 30 min prior to detorsion. In sham group (group s), the left testes were brought out through the incision and were placed back in the scrotum. After 2 hours of reperfu-sion 5ml intracardiac blood samples were taken.Blood plasma malondialdehyde (MDA), Glutathione peroxidase (GPx), cata-lase (CAT) and total antioxidant capacity (TAC) activities, and levels were measured.Results: Heparin significantly reduced MDA and increased CAT but GPX and TAC did not differ significantly in Hep group in comparison with T/DT group.Conclusion: Our results suggest that heparin treatment has a protective role on I/R-induced testicular injury.

Keywords:

Testicular Torsion , Antioxidant Activity , Heparin , MDA , CAT