Abstract

Peritoneal contamination is considered to be risk for anastomosis. In our study, the effect of vitamin C and lipoic acid combination on anastomosis healing following colonic anastomosis performed in rats with experimentally-induced intraabdominal sepsis has been investigated. The rats in the control group were given only routine enteral feed in the preoperative and postoperative periods. The rats in the vitamin C group were given 100 mg/kg vitamin C IV/S.C, the rats in the lipoic acid group were given 50 mg/kg lipoic acid daily via the peroral route, and the rats in the vitamin C + lipoic acid group were given vitamin C and lipoic acid via the same routes beginning from the operation day. Perforation was induced in the sigmoid colon and intraabdominal sepsis was induced, and this perforation site was resected 24 hours later and an end-to-end colonic anastomosis was performed. The anastomosis site was taken out of the abdomen and the bursting pressure was measured. Biochemical analysis was performed for this site in order to analyze the prolidase enzyme, hydroxyproline and malondialdehyde thereafter. While the mean bursting pressures and hydroxyproline levels of the combination group were found to be statistically significantly higher than those of the other study groups (p<0,001), the prolidase and malondialdehyde levels of the combination group were found to be statistically significantly lower than those of the other study groups. Use of antioxidants vitamin C and lipoic acid in combination provides better anatomosis healing and tension.