European Heart Journal (1983) 4 (Supplement H). 3-4 The calcium paradox: historical remarks

The discovery of the calcium paradox was the result of frustration and artefact! The frustration was the fact that isolated perfused hearts did not survive longer in the perfusion apparatus than they did, the artefact is neatly described!1) and should be ignored by everybody and is best forgotten, although we feel that this meeting (and the occasion for us to make a few historical remarks) justifies a short revival of this publication. Although the technique of coronary perfusion of an isolated heart had been known for a long time, since the publication of Langendorff in 1895 it is still, even today, not possible to make an isolated heart survive outside the body for relatively long periods. The isolated heart is a beautiful exper