Mailuoning Injection Attenuates Intestinal Ischemia-Reperfusion Injury in Rats

Background: Intestinal ischemia-reperfusion injury (IIR) is a common condition, which is caused by intestinal artery obstruction, extrusion of external objects and other internal organs, and vascular rupture. There is currently no specific method for preventing IIR. Two primary mechanisms of ischemia-reperfusion (I/R)-induced small intestine damages are apoptosis and increase in collagen fibers.Methods: In this study, we established an IIR model by cutting the rat superior mesenteric artery for 45 min and then performed reperfusion for 1 h. Thereafter, we investigated the protective effect and mechanisms of Mailuoning injection (MLN) in IIR.Results: Our results showed that MLN decreased the concentration of Malondialdehyde malondialdehyde (MDA), increased the concentration of Superoxide dismutase (SOD), and attenuated the oxidative stress damage in small intestines. In addition, MLN suppressed the expression of IL-6, fueled the expression of IL-10 and alleviated the inflammatory response. MLN was also shown to enhance the expression of Bcl-2 protein and while reducing the expression of Bax protein, demonstrating that MLN can prevent cell death. Besides, MLN pretreatment increased the expression of Akt, activated the PI3K/Akt signaling pathway, reduced the expression of Smad, and inhibited the TGF-β/Smad signaling pathway.Conclusions: In this study, activation of the PI3K/AKt pathway resulted in upregulation of Bcl-2 expression whereas that of Bax protein was decreased leading to the inhibition of apoptosis. The expression of Smad involved in the TGF-β/Smad signaling pathway was also suppressed to protect against fibrosis against IIR.