Persistent Left Ventricular Diastolic Stiffening Despite Cessation of Intermittent Myocardial Stretch in Swine

Objective Building on our observation that myocardial stretch induced by an acute elevation in left ventricular (LV) preload produces reversible systolic dysfunction and cardiomyocyte apoptosis, we recently demonstrated that swine subjected to intermittent myocardial stretch (IMS) for 2 weeks exhibit an adaptive increase in LV diastolic stiffness that protects the heart from stretch‐induced injury during subsequent periods of hemodynamic …