The vagal afferents discharge and myoelectrical activity in the gastric hyperalgesia model in rats

A long term exposure of the gastric mucosa to inflammatory factors is suspected to alter the normal stomach motility. The consequence of it is an abnormal sensomotor response to food causing dyspeptic symptoms. Our study aimed to investigate the vagal afferents activity and the gastro-duodenal slow wave response to the mild gastric mucosa inflammation in rats. The gastric mucosal inflammation was induced by addition iodoacetamide to drinking water for 5 days. The gastro-duodenal slow wave, vagal nerve recordings and the gastric mucosa examination were performed on 6th day. The iodoacetamide irritated gastric mucosa presented the minimal inflammatory infiltration with mast cells. The vagal afferent activity was significantly increased after iodoacetamide treatment from 0.3 ± 0.1 to 1.9 ± 0.58 Hz, (p<0.05). The gastric slow wave accurate frequencies extracted from the fast Fourier transform spectra accelerated from 0.08 ± 0.01 to 0.1 ± 0.02 Hz (p<0.05). The duodenal frequencies remained unchanged (from 0.64 ± 0.02 to 0.59 ± 0.1 Hz). These results suggest that mild gastric mucosa irritation sensitizes vagal afferents and alters gastric but not duodenal pacemaker activity which may contribute to dyspeptic sensations.