Elevated arterial lactate concentrations early after coronary artery bypass grafting are associated with increased anaerobic metabolism in skeletal muscle.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the effect of coronary artery bypass grafting with cardiopulmonary bypass on muscle perfusion, oxygen extraction, and lactate release during postoperative rest and exercise. DESIGN: Prospective observational study. SETTING: University hospital. PARTICIPANTS: Patients undergoing planned coronary artery bypass grafting. INTERVENTION: Knee-extensor exercise before and after coronary artery bypass grafting. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: Femoral artery blood flow was measured with ultrasound. Femoral vein blood and arterial blood were sampled at rest and during light exercise and were analyzed for hemoglobin, lactate, oxygen saturation, and oxygen partial pressure. Fourteen patients were tested before and after surgery. The arterial lactate concentrations were increased after surgery, both at rest and during light exercise. Resting arterial lactate increased from 0.65 (0.5-0.8) to 1.0 (0.9-1.3) mmol/L (p=0.01) (median and interquartile range). Furthermore, lactate was released from the leg even during postoperative rest, and the release of lactate was increased during postoperative exercise. There were no significant differences between the preoperative and postoperative femoral artery blood flow. Femoral vein oxygen partial pressure was reduced significantly after surgery, indicating reduced muscle cell oxygen partial pressure. CONCLUSIONS: The patients had elevated anaerobic metabolism in skeletal muscle after surgery to compensate for anemia. Lactate was released from the leg into the general circulation during postoperative rest and exercise. The postoperatively reduced hemoglobin concentration of 11.4 mg/dL (10.6-12.3) resulted in increased anaerobic metabolism and release of lactate from skeletal muscle. The authors concluded that coronary artery bypass grafting patients are susceptible to anaerobic metabolism even with maintained peripheral blood flow.

Bleeding following coronary surgery after preoperative low-molecular-weight heparin.

Low-molecular-weight heparin and acetyl salicylic acid have become an established treatment for unstable angina. A retrospective study on our database of one year was carried out to see what impact preoperative low-molecular-weight heparin versus none had on the postoperative course of 473 patients having coronary surgery exclusively. Apart from the fact that the low-molecular-weight heparin patients had a higher New York Heart Association classification and marginally more grafts, longer bypass and cross-clamp time, the preoperative characteristics and surgery of the two groups were similar. The low-molecular-weight heparin group had twice as many (9.7% versus 4.7%) re-operations for bleeding, 46% versus 26% had blood transfusion and 22.3% versus 12.6% plasma transfusion. The postoperative outcome was otherwise similar. Preoperative treatment of unstable angina with low-molecular-weight heparin carries a definite risk of postoperative bleeding. Although this study did not reveal any serious consequences, bleeding, transfusions and re-operations are associated with infections, wound healing problems and death. The indications and length of treatment with low-molecular-weight heparin in unstable angina patients have to be appropriate and the perioperative management of these patients has to address the bleeding tendency.