Interleukin-6 impairs chronotropic responsiveness to cholinergic stimulation and decreases heart rate variability in mice

Heart rate variability is reduced in several clinical settings associated with systemic inflammation. The underlying mechanism of decreased heart rate variability during systemic inflammation is unknown. It appears that the inflammatory cytokines might play a role, since epidemiologic studies has shown that circulating levels of interleukine-6 (IL-6) correlate significantly with indexes of depressed heart rate variability in various clinical conditions. The present investigation was carried out to study the peripheral and central effects of IL-6 on heart rate dynamic in mice. Adult male BALB/c mice were used in the study. RT-PCR was performed to study the expression of IL-6 receptor in mouse atrial and the results showed that gp130 mRNA was detectable in the atrium. The effect of IL-6 was also studies on chronotropic responsiveness of isolated atria to adrenergic and cholinergic stimulations. Incubation of isolated atria with 10 ng/ml of IL-6 was associated with a significant hypo-responsiveness to cholinergic stimulation (log IC50 of carbacholine changed from − 6.26 ± 0.10 in controls to − 5.59 ± 0.19 following incubation with IL-6, P < 0.05). The chronotropic responsiveness to adrenergic stimulation was identical with or without incubation with IL-6. Intraperitoneal injection of IL-6 (200 ng/mouse) was associated with a significant decrease in heart rate variability parameters (SDNN, SD1, and SD2). While intracerebroventricular injection of IL-6 (50 ng/mouse) had no significant effect on heart rate variability parameters. These data are in line with a peripheral role for IL-6 in the genesis of decreased heart rate variability during systemic inflammation.