General anesthesia with thoracic epidural anesthesia in the cardiopulmonary bypass surgery reduces apoptosis by upregulating antiapoptotic protein Bcl-2

Abstract

Aim. The aim of the paper was to investigate whether thoracic epidural anesthesia (TEA) together with general anaesthesia (GA) play a role on apoptosis in humans before cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB), before aortic cross clamp (ACC) and at 15 min after ACC release (after ischemia and reperfusion).