“…It is now widely accepted that beating heart surgery performed without the aid of CPB significantly attenuates cytokine and stress response ( Ganapathy et al , 2001 ; Raja, 2004 ; Yamaguchi et al , 2005 ; Lehmann et al , 2006 ). The reduced inflammatory response has been associated with improvement in organ function ( Ascione et al , 2000 , 2001 , 2002a , 2002b ; Caputo et al , 2002b ) and postoperative bleeding ( Raja and Dreyfus, 2006 ). However, as the inflammatory response is only reduced and not prevented, it is likely to continue to influence cardiac function and clinical outcome ( Quaniers et al , 2006 ).…”