ABSTRACT
Several dietary maneuvers can chronically augment endothelium-dependent relaxations in experimental animals. In the Dahl hypertensive rat, dietary supplementation with high potassium reduces the incidence of stroke without significantly altering blood pressure, suggesting a direct protective effect of the diet. Chronic dietary supplementation with potassium enhances endothelium-dependent relaxations to acetylcholine in Dahl salt-sensitive rats on a high sodium diet. Fish oil reduces the content in arachidonic acid of the platelets and increases their intracellular concentration of eicosapentaenoic acid. In the coronary artery of the pig, dietary supplementation with fish oil markedly enhances endothelium-dependent relaxation to aggregating platelets. A partial or complete prevention, or a reversal of the atherosclerotic process can be achieved by cessation of a high cholesterol diet. Therapeutic agents has become apparent that a number of clinically used drugs can modify endothelium-dependent responses and thus that this site of action should be taken into consideration when discussing their cardiovascular effects.
