Normal heart rateįor most people, the average heart rate is 60 - 100 beats per minute. The contraction forces blood out of the heart to the lungs and body, and the semilunar valves close. This impulse reaches the atrioventricular (AV) node, which acts as an electrical bridge carrying impulses from the atria to the ventricles after a brief delay.įrom the AV node, the impulse travels through a fiber pathway that sends the impulse into the ventricles, causing them to contract. The impulse spreads through the right and left atrial walls, causing them to contract and force blood into the ventricles.
The SA node produces the electrical impulses, which set the rate and rhythm of the heartbeat. With each heartbeat, an electrical impulse begins at the sinus, or sinoatrial (SA) node, the heart's natural pacemaker. This should motivate further pre-clinical and clinical studies to confirm these findings in humans,” he said.Heart rhythm is coordinated by the heart's own electrical system. “oes COVID exacerbate a pre-existing condition which they would later develop, or is it a direct effect? This study’s results prove the latter and suggest two FDA-approved medications which block this effect. Zaman, which he believes could be addressed in further research. The research has also ignited questions for Dr. I am not surprised as I am starting to see many patients, particularly younger ones, who have abnormal fast or slow heart rates post-COVID infection.” “The study shows that COVID-19 can directly infect the key cells responsible for maintaining a normal heartbeat. He said he had been observing SARS-CoV-2’s cardiovascular effects in his patients as of late. MNT also spoke with Junaid Zaman, M.D., Ph.D., a cardiologist at Keck Medicine of USC. More research would be needed to confirm these findings in humans. One limitation of the research is that it was a preclinical study involving animals and stem cell-derived pacemaker cells. “lthough physicians currently can use an artificial electronic pacemaker to replace the function of a damaged sinoatrial node, there’s the potential here to use sinoatrial cells such as we’ve developed as an alternative, cell-based pacemaker therapy,” he said. Evans, the findings bring about the potential for new therapies. “This highlights the importance to apply disease-relevant cells/organoids to study viral infection,” she stressed.Īccording to study author Dr. Chen confirmed that of all the cells and organoids they studied, they only detected ferroptosis in SARS-CoV-2-infected pacemaker cells. “We compared many tissue organoids, including lung organoids, intestine organoids, pancreatic endocrine organoids, liver organoids, etc, for their responses to SARS-CoV-2 infection,” she told MNT.ĭr. Here, we found that sinoatrial node pacemaker cells are very sensitive to SARS-CoV-2 infection.” “lthough arrhythmia has been reported in many COVID-19 patients, the cause of COVID-associated arrhythmia is unknown. The researchers wanted to see if these agents could remove iron from the bloodstream and stop ferroptosis.Ī chemical screen revealed that the drugs deferoxamine and imatinib could inhibit SARS-CoV-2-induced ferroptosis on the heart’s pacemaker cells.
They further examined whether the toxic effects of ferroptosis could be reversed by using specific chelating agents, chemical compounds that bind tightly to metal ions. Of the cell types they studied, the researchers discovered that the heart’s pacemaker cells were uniquely vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infection-induced ferroptosis. The researchers also observed Syrian golden hamsters ( Mesocricetus auratus) as they are susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection.įollowing nasal exposure to SARS-CoV-2, the researchers noted that their cardiac pacemaker cells were infected. The team from Weill Cornell Medicine used a type of pluripotent stem cell (hPSC) called human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) to derive human sinus node-like pacemaker cells. However, few reports have documented whether the sinus node could become infected with SARS-CoV-2 in individuals with COVID-19. The node controls cardiac rate and rhythm as part of the heart’s conduction system. The sinus node is the heart’s primary pacemaker, and damage to its structure causes bradycardia or a heart rate that is too slow.
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