RATIONALE During the last decennium a more focused attention has been directed to the presence of chronic inflammation in cardiovascular diseases (CVD), but mainly to the high impact that this one has in generating and fastening the atherosclerotic process. OBJECTIVE To highlight the causal relationship between periodontal diseases (PD) and CVD. One of the most important chronic inflammations...

vascular endothelial growth factor (vegf) is a multifunctional cytokine with distinct functions in angiogenesis, lymphangiogenesis, vascular permeability, and hematopoiesis. vegf is a highly conserved, disulfide-bonded dimeric glycoprotein of 34 to 45 kda produced by several cell types including fibroblasts, neutrophils, endothelial cells, and peripheral blood mononuclear cells, particularly t ...