Endothelium-dependent vasodilation is impaired in patients with essential hypertension. The objective of this study was to determine whether long-term treatment with angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors improves endothelium-dependent vasodilation in forearm resistance vessels of patients with hypertension. Furthermore, since tissue thiols may be relevant to nitric oxide-mediated vasodilatio...

To test the hypothesis that obesity/insulin resistance impairs both endothelium-dependent vasodilation and insulin-mediated augmentation of endothelium-dependent vasodilation, we studied leg blood flow (LBF) responses to graded intrafemoral artery infusions of methacholine chloride (MCh) or sodium nitroprusside (SNP) during saline infusion and euglycemic hyperinsulinemia in lean insulin-sensiti...

OBJECTIVE Nitroglycerine-induced vasodilation has been used as a control test for flow-mediated vasodilation (FMD) to differentiate endothelium-dependent from endothelium-independent response when evaluating endothelial function in humans. Recently, nitroglycerine-induced vasodilation has also been reported to be impaired in patients with atherosclerosis. The purpose of this study was to determ...

Pressure-induced vasodilation, a neurovascular mechanism relying on the interaction between mechanosensitive C-fibers and vessels, allows skin blood flow to increase in response to locally nonnociceptive applied pressure that in turn may protect against pressure ulcers. We expected that severe neuropathy would dramatically affect pressure-induced vasodilation in diabetic mice, and we aimed to d...

A novel histamine receptor subtype, histamine H(3) receptor, mediates inhibition of peripheral autonomic neurotransmission. The present study was designed to examine vascular effects of histamine H(3) receptor by using a selective histamine H(3) receptor agonist, R-(-)-alpha methylhistamine (alpha-methylhistamine), in rat mesenteric resistance arteries. The isolated mesenteric vascular beds wer...

Background Endothelium-dependent vasodilation in response to acetylcholine (ACh) and ischemic vasodilation during reactive hyperemia are attenuated in the forearm of patients with heart failure (HF). It has been shown that L-arginine augments endothelium-dependent vasodilation in healthy subjects. Thus, the aim of the present study was to determine if L-arginine improves endothelium-dependent a...

BACKGROUND   Arterial compliance and endothelium-dependent vasodilation are two characteristics of the vessel wall. In the Prospective Investigation of the Vasculature in Uppsala Seniors (PIVUS) study we studied the relationships between arterial compliance and endothelium-dependent vasodilation versus the Ankle-Brachial index (ABI), a clinically used index of peripheral artery disease. METHO...

BACKGROUND Hypercholesterolemia and sickle cell disease (SCD) impair endothelium-dependent vasodilation by dissimilar mechanisms. Hypercholesterolemia impairs vasodilation by a low-density lipoprotein (LDL)-dependent mechanism. SCD has been characterized as a chronic state of inflammation in which xanthine oxidase (XO) from ischemic tissues increases vascular superoxide anion (O2*-) generation....

The vasodilator effect of the ethanolic extract of leaves from Hancornia speciosa Gomes (HSE) was evaluated in superior mesenteric artery rings. HSE produced a concentration-dependent vasodilation (IC50 = 10.8 +/- 4.0 microg/mL) in arterial rings pre-contracted with phenylephrine, which was completely abolished in endothelium-denuded vessels. Endothelium-dependent vasodilation induced by HSE wa...