Research to use scorpion venom can help reduce heart bypass failures

A Leeds University study is using venom taken from scorpions to help reduce the number of heart bypass failures.

The research found that a toxin in the venom, called margatoxin, is over 100 times more potent at preventing the most common cause of bypass graft failure than any other known compound. The toxin, which comes from the Central American bark scorpion, is effective in preventing neointimal hyperplasia, which is the blood vessel’s natural response to injury.

The research, which is being funded by the British Heart Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the Medical Research Council, is confident that margatoxin could eventually be able to be used as a spray-on treatment to the vein itself once it has been removed and is waiting to be grafted onto the heart.

Professor David Beech, from Leeds University’s Faculty of Biological Sciences, said that the potency of the toxin, in suppressing the injury response, surprised the research team. He said: “It’s staggeringly potent. We’re talking about very few molecules in order to obtain an effect.”

Around 25,000 coronary artery bypass grafts are carried out each year in the UK, according to the British Heart Foundation. They usually last about 10 to 15 years.