Background: Physical activity and sport act as a non-drug treatment and prevention of non-contagious diseases. Accordingly, one of the most widely used tools is endurance training. The aim of this study was to survey the pre-treatment effects of continuous and intermittent endurance training on the gene expression of osteopontin in the heart tissue of male wistar rats following the induction of myocardial infarction.
Materials and Methods: In the present study, 32 rats were kept under standard conditions and divided into four groups (healthy control group, ischemic control group, continuous training group and intermittent training group). The healthy control group did not undergo myocardial infarction, while the ischemic control group underwent induced myocardial infarction after eight weeks. The training groups also did endurance training on treadmills for eight weeks and were subjected to induced myocardial infarction after 48 hours of rest. One week after confirmed occurrence of ischemia, the rats’ hearts were isolated and qRT-PCR was used to measure OPN gene expression.
Results: The results of this research showed that OPN gene expression in the heart tissue of male wistar rats increased significantly after the induction of myocardial infarction compared to the healthy control group (p<0/05). Also, the relative expression of this gene in the ischemia control group was significantly higher than both the two training groups (p<0/05). Comparing the two types of training, the relative level of OPN expression in the group that underwent continuous training was lower (p<0/05).
Conclusion: Cardiac infarction leads to an increase in cardiovascular risk factors and cardiac fibrosis. Endurance training, especially regular continuous training, can moderate the increase in these factors.