Arteries and veins formed within renal vessels: a previously neglected observation

Summary

An abnormality of blood vessels was noted in a biopsy of a renal transplant. This took the form of apparent development of a new artery inside and concentric with the old, with elastic laminae and a muscular media, separated from the old internal elastic lamina by poorly cellular tissue. In a systematic study of material from another 119 renal transplants, 13 nephrectomy specimens for chronic pyelonephritis and hydronephrosis, 28 renal biopsies showing interstitial nephritis, and 18 renal biopsies showing small vessel vasculopathy of accelerated hypertensive type, similar arterial changes were seen in another 10 renal transplants that showed chronic vascular rejection, 1 case of chronic interstitial nephritis, and 3 cases of vasculopathy, 2 with accelerated hypertension and 1 with systemic sclerosis. One renal transplant also showed apparent development of new muscular veins inside old veins. Immunohistological study for smooth muscle actin confirmed that the apparently new arterial and venous structures contained smooth muscle cells. The arterial abnormality may be called arterialisation of intrarenal arteries. This change appears to be not rare, is distinctive, and has scarcely been previously recognised or reported as a response of intrarenal blood vessels to damage.