Evaluation of Drugs Active against Experimental Atherosclerosis

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the evaluation of drugs active against experimental atherosclerosis. Atherosclerosis is generally accepted to be a disorder of lipid metabolism. When dealing with complex pathogenic entities such as atherogenesis, it is important, though difficult, to separate causal factors from symptoms. One of the main questions in this regard centers around the role of hyperlipidemia in the etiology and pathogenesis of the various forms of chronic arterial disease. Control of blood lipid levels is now one of the main goals of therapeutic research, and, as pointed out by Steinberg, it has to be achieved to designate hyperlipidemia as a determining factor in the genesis of human atherosclerosis. The simplest way of keeping blood lipid levels low would be to alter drastically present dietary habits and to encourage physical exercise. Ingestion of highly unsaturated fatty acids supplemented to an ordinary diet has the effect of increasing lipid absorption. Alteration of plasma lipoprotein composition by heparin has not been proven to be of therapeutic value.