Chloralose anesthesia in the dog: a study of drug actions and analytical methodology

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Abstract
This investigation consisted of two parts: 1) studies on the cardiovascular effects of a-chloralose in intact dogs and dog heart-lung preparations, and 2) description of a method for evaluating the effects of drugs on isolated systems. Intact dogs, maintained at constant depth of anesthesia with chloralose administered as a continuous slow intravenous infusion, exhibited a progressively rising heart rate which stabilized at an elevated level after 1 1/2 hr, a stroke volume which remained stable for about 3 hr and then steadily declined, and a stable but hypertensive arterial pressure throughout. Chloralose added to dog heart-lung preparations resulted in marked depression of function, with decrease in stroke volume, left ventricular stroke work, and ventricular dp/dt, and rise in ventricular end diastolic pressure. A technique for evaluating changes in function by analyzing changes in slope (measured parameters plotted against time) following the addition of chloralose was developed for the heart-lung preparation studies. This analytical method did not require the presupposition of steady-state conditions and included an intrinsic time-course control.