The protective effect of L-arginine, tadalafil, and their combination in rat testes after ischemia and reperfusion injury

Introduction: Nitric oxide (NO) plays an important role in the ischemia and reperfusion process. In this study, we aimed to examine the effect of L-arginine, tadalafil, and their combination for preventionof the ischemia reperfusion injury after testis torsion in rats.Methods: A total of 40 adult, male Sprague-Dawley rats were allocated into five groups. Three hours of left testicular torsion was performed in each group, excluding the control group. While the ischemia reperfusion (I/R) group had no treatment, I/R + Arg group received L-arginine, I/R + Td group received tadalafil and I/R + Arg + Td group received tadalafil and L-arginine 30 minutes before the detorsion. Then the left testis was untwisted for four hours of reperfusion. After bilateral orchiectomy, lipid peroxidation (LPx) and glutathione (GSH) activities were examined in testicular tissue.Spermatogenesis was evaluated with Johnsen’s score.Results: LPx levels of the I/R group were found to be significantly higher than for groups that received drugs for both testes (p