Coronary artery disease is a major complication of diabetes that correlates with high morbidity and mortality after myocardial infarction (Abbud et aI., 1995). Experimental studies of diabetes effects on ischemia/ reperfusion injury have shown contradictory results, inclUding a decrease, (Feuvray and Lopaschuk, 1997) increase (Paulson, 1997) or no change
(Pijl et aI., 1994) in sensitivity. These contradictory results appear to be due to differences in the duration and severity of the diabetic state. Studies have shown that the diabetic heart is resistant to ischemia/reperfusion injury during early phases of the disease, and becomes more sensitive to ischemia/reperfusion injury as the disease progresses (Ravingerova et al., 2003; Xu et al., 2004).