ABSTRACT
The ideal animal model for atherosclerosis research would develop lesions gradually during its lifetime. With appropriate treatment, lesions would regress. Risk factors for atherosclerosis (plasma cholesterol profiles, blood pressure, body weight, age, and gender) would be similar to human beings. The animals would develop clinical manifestations of atherosclerosis in late middle and old age. The prevalence of clinical manifestations would be similar to human beings. Atherosclerotic lesions in the ideal model would range from mild abnormalities, such as fatty streaks, to raised plaques with complications such as ulceration, stenosis, intraplaque hemorrhage, and superimposed thrombosis. The number of animals developing such complicated lesions would constitute about 20% of the population, with males developing complications more frequently than females, particularly in the coronary arteries. Clinically significant lesions would be found first in the aorta, later in the coronary arteries, and later still in arteries supplying the brain. The end-organ complications of myocardial and cerebral ischemia and infarction would be seen in animals with complicated lesions. Formation of aneurysm in the aorta would develop occasionally. Most importantly, all of these criteria would take place in an animal sufficiently large to allow diagnostic and therapeutic measurements similar to those useful for human beings.
