Hemorheology and peripheral arterial diseases

Abstract

The interpretation of the role of the hemorheological alterations in peripheral obliterative arterial diseases is still of considerable interest. After the first identification of the existence of a hyperviscosity condition in this disease, successive research has gradually tried to explain its meaning. First hyperviscosity was considered as associated to the disease, then some researchers have attributed it a decisive and essential role and have seen it capable, by itself, of reducing the blood supply to the tissue, while others have considered it just a subordinate expression of the disease. A last hypothesis tries to combine these two possibilities and considers the hyperviscosity of vascular diseases first as dependent on the tissue ischemia and then as responsible for the activation of a vicious circle which further contributes to reduce the peripheral blood flow. In such interpretation the therapeutical attempts to treat the peripheral vascular diseases by means of the improvement of blood fluidity should assume a positive role.