e studied the effects of
angiotensin-convertingenzyme inhibitor on
the response of arterial intima afterballoon denudation.
Captopril (3 mg. kg-1/d) was
ad-ministered to 4 miniature pigs after abdominal aortic bal-loon denudation. As controls , 4 pigs
were only denudedabdominal aorta without using captopril. All animalswere given high
cholesterol diet immediately after ab-dominal aortic denudation. At the end of the 6th and10th
month , 8 pigs were sacrificed equally in two times.Irregular protrusion of arterial wall was
observed in allanimals at gross anatomy. Inthe control group, theatherosclerotic plaque was
identified via sudan stains.The neointima
proliferative response after arterial de-nudation was
found, but the degree of neointima proliferation at captopril group was significantly decreased
ascompared to non-captopril group (P< 0. 01 ).Micro-scopic examination showed smooth muscle
cell prolifera-tion of arterial neointima in non-captopril group, whileslight connective tissue
proliferation in captopril group.Electronmicroscopically endothelial cells showed protru-sion and
their connective gap was increased in the con-trol group. Many platelets were adhered to the
arterialneointima, the smcoth muscle cells were mainly of sec-retary type in the same group.
The endothelial cellswere normal. smcoth muscle cells of the neointima weremainly of
contractile type in the captopril group. Theseresults illustrate that
angiotensin-converting
enzyme in-hibitor inhibites the proliferative response after arterialintima denudation, on the
other hand, angiotensin-con-verting enzyme may play an important role in
neointimaproliferative response after intima injury.