Anti-proliferative effect of pyridinolcarbamate and of aspirin in the early stages of atherogenesis in swine.

When young swine are fed a suitable hyperlipidemic (HL) diet the number of cells in intimal cell masses (ICM) of large and medium-sized arteries begins to increase in number; by 90 days on the diet the cell increase is several-fold compared to no significant increase in cell numbers in ICM of mash-fed controls. The objective of the current study was to see if the cell increase associated with the HL diet could be reduced by pyridinolcarbamate or aspirin. Arteries studied were the abdominal aorta and the coronaries; time on HL diet was 90 days. Both drugs resulted in significant reductions in the increases in cells in ICM associated with the HL diet in both of the arterial beds that were studied. The reduction was most prominent in the abdominal aorta where the increase in ICM cells in the untreated HL diet-fed swine was from an average of 242 +/- 50 cells per cross-section in the mash-fed controls to 1925 +/- 556; in the pyridinolcarbamate-treated swine the increase was only to 641 +/- 214 and in the aspirin-treated group to 770 +/- 146.