Male Hartley guinea pigs weighing 300–400 g were purchased from Chengdu Dossy experimental animals Co., Ltd. (Chengdu, China). Each guinea pig was assigned to the sham group (n = 5), ET group (n = 5), or ET + AA treatment group (n = 5). All animals were kept in standard conditions for 1 week as the acclimation period and they had free access to food and water. Then, the animals were restricted to food for 12 h and restricted to water for 2 h and anesthetized by IP injection of 40 mg/kg sodium pentobarbital. After shaving, a midline incision was made at the anterior neck, followed by blunt dissection to expose the right common carotid artery and the left external jugular vein. A tunnel under the skin was built using an anesthetic puncture trocar from the back of the neck to the edge of the midline incision. A PE50 tube filled with saline containing 500 IU/mL heparin was nested in the trocar and embedded in the tunnel by extracting the trocar. The outer end of the tube was connected to the heparin cap, and the inner end of the tube was intubated to each vessel. Immediately after the surgery, the animals were administrated a subcutaneous dose of meloxicam (1 mg/kg) and then were individually housed to recover for 24 h. The animal study protocol was approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee of the Institute of Blood Transfusion, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, and Peking Union Medical College (protocol code 2018032, approved on 31 Aug 2018).
Free full text: Click here
