Increased sensitivity of the denervated transplanted human heart to isoprenaline both before and after beta-adrenergic blockade.

It is not known whether surgical denervation leads to increased beta-receptor sensitivity after human cardiac transplantation. We assessed cardiac beta-receptor sensitivity by studying the heart rate response to isoprenaline of the denervated donor heart as compared with the innervated recipient heart in eight patients who underwent heterotopic cardiac transplantation and in six patients with orthotopic transplantation. Changes in the donor and …