Effect of Chlorpromazine on Survival From Hemorrhagic Shock

¹ From the Department of Physiology and the Cardiovascular Laboratory, State University of Iowa, College of Medicine, Iowa City, Iowa

In dogs subjected to a standard procedure of irreversible hemorrhagic shock, a 2-mg/kg dose of chlorpromazine administered 30 minutes previous to the hemorrhage has been found to exert a protective action in terms of survival. No beneficial action of the chlorpromazine was evident when this dosage of the drug was given 5 hours prior to or immediately after the initial hemorrhage. When chlorpromazine was administered in a dose of 5 mg/kg 30 minutes before the onset of bleeding the survival frequency was not significantly different from that observed in the control animals. While the mechanism of the protective action of chlorpromazine in hemorrhagic shock has not been revealed by these studies, the results indicate that it is not primarily a function of the autonomic blocking properties of the drug. Neither is it related directly to the smaller hemorrhage required to induce a standard level of hemorrhagic hypotension.

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