ABSTRACT

Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of morbidity and mortality, disability, and economic loss in industrialized states (1). Myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury and acute myocardial infarction (MI) are significant consequences of clinical events during cardiac surgery, progression of coronary artery disease, and cardiac arrest (2). Acute MI leads to left ventricular (LV) remodeling, including expansion or aneurysm formation due to cardiomyocyte death in infarcted regions and LV dilation associated with hypertrophy and fibrosis of noninfarcted regions (3). Targeted delivery of cardioprotective drugs into the ischemic myocardium to prevent the MI/R damage may be one of the possible ways to reduce the number of heart failures.