The effects of the local anesthetic bupivacaine on cardiac action potentials (APs) are mainly attributed to inhibition of cardiac Na(+) channels. The relevance of its ability to also induce high-affinity blockade of human ether-à-gogo-related gene (hERG) channels is unclear. We investigated whether this interaction may functionally become more significant in cellular and computational models of long (L)QT syndromes.
The effects of the local anesthetic bupivacaine on cardiac action potentials (APs) are mainly attributed to inhibition of cardiac Na(+) channels. The relevance of its ability to also induce high-affinity blockade of human ether-à-gogo-related gene (hERG) channels is unclear. We investigated whether this interaction may functionally become more significant in cellular and computational models of long (L)QT syndromes.