Introduction: Cardiovascular disease is currently the most common global disease. Cardiac arrhythmia is one of the most common types of heart diseases and main cause of mortality. Gallic acid (GA), as an antioxidant agent, has many preventive effects on diseases, and its Cardioprotective activity in myocardial infarction has been also reported. On the other hand, it is well documented that exercise-induced increase in myocardial manganese antioxidant activity is vital for protection against cardiac injuries. Thus, the present study investigated the antiarrhythmic activity of exercise training and GA supplementation alone or combined, on CaCl2-induced arrhythmia in rats.
Materials and Methods: In this study, 32 male Sprague-Dawley rats (4-6 months old and weighing 200-250 g) were randomly assigned to four groups: Control, GA (50 mg/kg, gavage, 10 days), Exercise (21-days) and Exercise+GA. Then, lead II electrocardiogram was recorded to calculate HR and voltage of QRS complex. Also, the percentage of ventricular premature beats (VPB), ventricular fibrillation (VF) and ventricular tachycardia (VT) were recorded after the injection of CaCl2 (140 mg/kg, i.v) in all groups. Results were analyzed by using ANOVA and Fisher’s exact test and P<0.05 was considered as significant level.
Results: The data gathered in this study showed negative chronotropic and positive inotropic effects in the exercise and GA groups as compared to the control group. Also, co-administration of GA and exercise showed that incidence of ventricular premature beat, ventricular tachycardia and ventricular fibrillation reduced significantly as compared to the control group.
Conclusions: The results suggest that the combination of exercise and GA supplementation has a protective role in preventing and treating cardiac disorders by decreasing incidence of cardiac arrhythmias.