Abstract
Inner capsules of Dacron vascular prostheses were examined under both light and electronmicroscopes from 1 to 1184 days after implantation in the thoracic aorta of 60 dogs.
At an early stage of implantation, it was noticed that inner capsules showed the same transformations as that of the organization of thrombus adhered to the glasses inserted in dog femoral arteries. This healing process of inner capsules was similar to that of a hypothesis of arterial thickening caused by the organization of thrombus on the arterial wall.
It was observed that the first appearance of the young spherical endothelial cells were found near the sites of suture lines and next on the center region of inner caps ules especially on the bottom of the crimps sporadically. On the center region, endothelial cells covered the surface of inner capsule by increasing their number and getting large and flat in shape.
These results indicated that the young cells on the bottom areas were originated from the endothelial cells carried by blood stream from the proximal suture line. It may be possible that similar phenomena could be observed on the small Dacron hubs suspended in the axis of knitted crimped Dacron prostheses implanted in the thoracic aorta.
