Recent evidence indicates that contraction of vascular smooth muscle may be regulated by two calcium-dependent mechanisms: activation of myosin kinase, and calcium binding to a second, unknown regulatory site. This hypothesis implies that vasodilators could modify vascular tone by several mechanisms, including inactivation of myosin kinase. Since relaxation of the carotid artery following agoni...

The management of patients with congenital heart disease (CHD) and pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) has changed dramatically with the development of targeted therapy with selective pulmonary vasodilators. The number of adult Japanese patients with PAH associated with CHD is increasing. It is important to develop evidence-based guidelines for the management of these patients, and to achieve...

Chronic hypoxia is associated with altered pulmonary vasoreactivity, and it has been suggested that an increased response to voltage-dependent vasodilators may relate to enhanced Ca++ entry via voltage-dependent channels, secondary to depolarization. Few studies have been performed on small pulmonary arteries, and it is unknown whether they are depolarized after chronic hypoxia. We examined the...

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES Sensory neural hearing loss (SNHL) is a disorder characterised by an important deterioration of the auditory function. Re-establishing normal ion homeostasis of the endolymph could be related to hearing recovery and it might be mediated by mineralocorticoids. The main purpose of this preliminary, randomized controlled clinical trial was assessing the recovery of idio...

Pleuropulmonary fibrosis is a rare, but well-recognized adverse effect of ergot alkaloids. We report on four patients who developed pleural and/or pulmonary fibrosis during treatment with pergolide and give characteristics of 87 cases with one or more symptoms of serosal fibrosis. Retroperitoneal and pleuropulmonary fibrosis are serious conditions, which are often irreversible after drug withdr...

may make it a more appropriate agent for testing the vasodilator response. Background – In patients with primary (Thorax 1997;52:369–372) pulmonary hypertension who respond to vasodilators acutely, survival can be im

The use of vasodilators to reduce vascular resistance is over a hundred years old. BALFOUR [1] recommends the use of nitrites as vascular stimulants "which dilate the peripheral vessels (arterioles) and so promote the flow blood". In the case of primary pulmonary hypertension (PPH), vaso-constriction is one of three factors that combine to increase resistance to blood flow through the lungs. Th...