ABSTRACT
Aging (Chapter 19), hypertension (Chapter 20), atherosclerosis (Chapter 23), diabetes (Chapter 25), and renal failure (Chapter 25) are the most common causes of altered arterial hemodynamics and of disturbed blood flow in the arteries of human subjects. There are a number of other conditions that can do likewise, but which are either less common or less potent in their effect. These are discussed here. As for the more common causes of arterial dysfunction, these act through either narrowing or occluding an artery and/or stiffening the artery, and/or creating abnormal reflection, and/or causing the artery to rupture. Effects can be manifest as ischemia of tissues downstream, as increased load on the heart and arteries upstream, or (through rupture) as disturbance of surrounding tissues or loss of blood.
