[Morphological alterations of the rat myocardium in chronic morphine intoxication].

Morphine was administered intraperitoneally to Wistar rats at increasing doses from 10 to 60 mg pay during 8 days. Cardiomyocyte damage in the form of myocytolysis and wave-like deformations of muscle fibers prevailed at the level of light microscopy. Microcirculatory alterations were characteristic: stasis, sludge-phenomenon, perivascular and interstitial oedema, diapedes hemorrhages, focal proliferation of vascular wall cells. Ultrastructural lesions were as follows: subsarcolemma edema, mitochondrial destruction, formation of giant forms of mitochondria, single contractures, increasing micropinocytosis, intestitial edema.