"Ozone is damaging, and it is really a problem that we are going to have to think about in the next few years," says Wentworth. "There may be a whole slew of molecules that ozone generates that we have never thought about before."
Finally, Lerner, Wentworth, and their colleagues detail how one of the atheronals was found in the blood of patients who have late-stage atherosclerosis, but not in healthy individuals. This suggests that the presence of atheronals may be a good indicator of late-stage arterial inflammation--perhaps the basis for a diagnostic test for atherosclerosis.
Currently, physicians use other risk factors to identify a patient's risk: elevated cholesterol, hypertension, diabetes, smoking, obesity and a family history of vascular disease at an age less than 55. These indicators are not always reliable, and there is a substantial fraction of patients who develop atherosclerosis without displaying these risk factors.
Sensitive diagnostic markers that would allow early identification of patients at risk of life-threatening atherosclerosis would be a boon to preventative medicine.
Atherosclerosis and Ozone
Atherosclerosis is a common vascular disease that increases the risk of heart attacks and strokes. In fact, heart disease is the most common cause of death in the United States. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics for 2000 list 878,471 deaths from heart disease and stroke, followed by 553,091 for cancer.
The name of the disease comes from the Greek athero (which means gruel or paste) and sclerosis (which means hardness). And, as the name implies, it is a disease that is characterized by a hardening of the arteries over time due to the buildup of hard plaques--fibrous tissue, calcium, fat, cholesterol, proteins, cells, and other materials--on the inner "endothelial" walls of an artery. These plaques feel something like cartilage to the touch, which explains why atheroscl
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Contact: Jason Bardi
jasonb@scripps.edu
858-784-9254
Scripps Research Institute
6-Nov-2003