Long-term brain damage from strokes may be reduced by saving cells that control blood flow, new research shows.
The study found using drugs to save the pericyte cells – which expand and contract to regulate blood flow in capillaries – may reduce lasting blood flow impairment. It was previously believed blood flow was solely controlled by arterioles, blood vessels that branch out from larger arteries and into smaller capillaries.
In a lab setting, researchers identified chemicals that halved pericyte death from a simulated stroke.
Lead researcher David Attwell is hopeful the discovery could help create drugs to prevent the cells dying, and reduce disability caused by stroke.
Read more at University of Oxford