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Splenectomy impairs diffusive oxygen transport in the lung of dogs

Departments of ¹Internal Medicine and ²Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas

Submitted 20 December 2005 ; accepted in final form 14 March 2006

The spleen acts as an erythrocyte reservoir in highly aerobic species such as the dog and horse. Sympathetic-mediated splenic contraction during exercise reversibly enhances convective O₂ transport by increasing hematocrit, blood volume, and O₂-carrying capacity. Based on theoretical interactions between erythrocytes and capillary membrane (Hsia CCW, Johnson RL Jr, and Shah D. J Appl Physiol 86: 1460–1467, 1999) and experimental findings in horses of a postsplenectomy reduction in peripheral O₂-diffusing capacity (Wagner PD, Erickson BK, Kubo K, Hiraga A, Kai M, Yamaya Y, Richardson R, and Seaman J. Equine Vet J 18, Suppl: 82–89, 1995), we hypothesized that splenic contraction also augments diffusive O₂ transport in the lung. Therefore, we have measured lung diffusing capacity (DL_CO) and its components during exercise by a rebreathing technique in six adult foxhounds before and after splenectomy. Splenectomy eliminated exercise-induced polycythemia, associated with a 30% reduction in maximal O₂ uptake. At any given pulmonary blood flow, DL_CO was significantly lower after splenectomy owing to a lower membrane diffusing capacity, whereas pulmonary capillary blood volume changed variably; microvascular recruitment, indicated by the slope of the increase in DL_CO with respect to pulmonary blood flow, was also reduced. We conclude that splenic contraction enhances both convective and diffusive O₂ transport and provides another compensatory mechanism for maintaining alveolar O₂ transport in the presence of restrictive lung disease or ambient hypoxia.

blood volume; red cell volume; hematocrit; lung diffusing capacity; membrane diffusing capacity; pulmonary capillary blood volume; cardiac output; maximal oxygen uptake; exercise; spleen; canine

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