[Mediacalcinosis of the aorta (pathomorphology and pathogenesis of arterial calcification and its relationship to atherosclerosis)].

It is established on the material of 116 legal-medical autopsies of 11-50-year-old subjects deceased of occasional causes that calcinosis of the aorta media appears in subjects under 20 years and progresses with age. As distinct from the aorta, the first calcium deposits in the coronary arteries appear in the intima, in the foci of muscular-elastic hyperplasia. Calcium deposits in the coronary and other arteries appear a decade later than in the aorta. The beginning of the mediacalcinosis coincides in time with focal intima lipoidosis but the correlation between the intima thickening and the intensity of mediacalcinosis is not observed. Calcinosis of the atherosclerotic plaques appears in preexisting mediacalcinosis. Calcium deposits are closely linked with the elastica, and the media calcinosis occurs in the elastica destruction and is not followed by proliferation of the smooth cells. Cell membrane fragments and vesicular structures are found ultrastructurally in the calcinosis foci, this suggesting that the mediacalcinosis is connected with the elastica destruction and the smooth cell death.