Differences between the arterial and the venous pathomorphology in Buerger's disease.

Morphological lesions were found to be different in arteries and in veins, in 9 cases of Buerger's disease. The arterial lesions were not characteristic and consisted of non-specific inflammation, thrombosis and obliteration which also occur in many other disease. In contrast, in addition to wall infiltration and thrombosis, the veins showed microabscesses and giant cell granulomas, which we believe to be absent in all other known diseases. The affected venous segment exhibited a variety of lesions. In the earliest period, the morphological aspect of inflammation in arteries and veins was fairly similar. In a late periods, that is those of vascular obliteration, the arteries and veins did not show any distinguishing morphological differences.