Introduction: It has been known that both statins and exercise have beneficial effects in preventing cardiovascular diseases; however, there is no information about their combined effects on the amount of tissue damage after myocardial infarction. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the combined effect of endurance training and atorvastatin on the extent of necrosis and fibrosis tissue in rat hearts following myocardial infarction.

Materials & methods: 45 rats (8-10 weeks old, 230 ± 10 g body weight) were randomly divided to five groups. Sham, control, endurance training, atorvastatin, and exercise +atovastatin. Myocardial infarction was induced by subcutaneous injection of isoprenaline (150 mg/kg) in two consecutive days. Drug and training intervention was initiated 2 days after infarction and continued for 4 weeks. In order to assess the necrosis lesion and fibrosis tissue, Hematoxylin – Eosin and massontrichrome staining were used respectively. Data were analyzed using one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) at P<0/05 level.

Findings: The combination of endurance exercise and atorvastatin significantly reduced the amount of necrosis and fibrosis tissue compared with the control group (P< 0/05). Endurance exercise training alone induced non-significant increase in the extent of necrosis damage and significantly increased fibrosis tissue. atorvastatin consumption reduced necrosis damage, but no effect on the extent of fibrosis tissue.

Discussion & Conclusions: results of this study showed that the combination of training and atorvastatin are more effective in improving tissue damage caused by myocardial infarction  than exercise and atorvastatin alone.