Photobiomodulation therapy combined with carvedilol attenuates post-infarction heart failure by suppressing excessive inflammation and oxidative stress in rats

The post-myocardial infarction heart failure (HF) still carries a huge burden since current therapy is unsuccessful to abrogate poor prognosis. Thus, new approaches are needed, and photobiomodulation therapy (PBMt) may be a way. However, it is not known whether PBMt added to a standard HF therapy provides additional improvement in cardiac remodeling in infarcted rats. This study sought to determine the combined carvedilol-drug and PBMt with low-level laser therapy value in HF. Rats with large infarcts were treated for 30 days. The functional fitness was evaluated using a motorized treadmill. Echocardiography and hemodynamic measurements were used for functional evaluations of left ventricular (LV). ELISA, Western blot and biochemical assays were used to evaluate inflammation and oxidative stress in the myocardium. Carvedilol and PBMt had a similar action in normalizing pulmonary congestion and LV end-diastolic pressure, attenuating LV dilation, and improving LV systolic function. Moreover, the application of PBMt to carvedilol-treated rats inhibited myocardial hypertrophy and improved +dP/dt of LV. PBMt alone prevented inflammation with a superior effect than carvedilol. Carvedilol and PBMt normalized 4-hydroxynonenal (a lipoperoxidation marker) levels in the myocardium. However, importantly, the addition of PBMt to carvedilol attenuated oxidized protein content and triggered a high activity of the anti-oxidant catalase enzyme. In conclusion, these data show that the use of PBMt plus carvedilol therapy results in a significant additional improvement in HF in a rat model of myocardial infarction. These beneficial effects were observed to be due, at least in part, to decreased myocardial inflammation and oxidative stress.