This Article  • References  • Full text PDF  • Reply to article  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citation map  • Citing articles on HighWire  • Citing articles on Web of Science (26)  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in this journal  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Walter G. Bradley, DM; Michael D. O'Brien, MD; Dennis N. Walder, MD; Dorothy Murchison, BSc; Margaret Johnson, PhD; David J. Newell, PhD

Arch Neurol. 1975;32(7):466-473.

Abstract
The vascular hypothesis of the cause of muscular dystrophy suggests that ischemia is responsible for the muscle fiber necrosis. A xenon 133 clearance study of muscle blood flow in Duchenne and other muscular dystrophies showed no obvious difference between the response to exercise and arterial occlusion compared with control subjects. Radioautographic study of distribution of 4-¹²⁵l-antipyrine in skeletal muscle of mice with muscular dystrophy showed no abnormal areas of ischemia.

A statistical examination was also made of the grouping of damaged fibers, one of the observations on which the vascular hypothesis was based. Only 0.9% of fibers undergoing phagocytosis occurred in groups of four or more fibers in greater frequency than would have been expected by chance, and 70% of such fibers were isolated. These studies argue strongly against the vascular hypothesis of the cause of muscular dystrophy.

Author Affiliations
From the Muscular Dystrophy Research Laboratories, Newcastle General Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, England.

Footnotes
Accepted for publication Sept 3, 1974.

Reprint requests to Muscular Dystrophy Research Laboratories, Newcastle General Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE4 6BE, England (Prof. Bradley).

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?

THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES

Function and Genetics of Dystrophin and Dystrophin-Related Proteins in Muscle
Blake et al.
Physiol. Rev. 2002;82:291-329.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT  

The Muscular Dystrophies and Related Disorders: I. The Muscular Dystrophies
Furukawa and Peter
JAMA 1978;239:1537-1542.
ABSTRACT  

Abnormal Iris Vasculature in Myotonic Dystrophy: An Anterior Segment Angiographic Study
Stern et al.
Arch Neurol 1978;35:224-227.
ABSTRACT  

Pathogenesis of Muscular Dystrophies
Rowland
Arch Neurol 1976;33:315-321.
ABSTRACT  

Functional muscle ischemia in neuronal nitric oxide synthase-deficient skeletal muscle of children with Duchenne muscular dystrophy
Sander et al.
Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 2000;97:13818-13823.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT