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Improvements in the Rheologic Properties of Blood Induced by Medium-Term Treatment with Buflomedil in Diabetic Patients

Introduction Buflomedil hydrochloride is a vasoactive agent widely used, since 1976, for the treatment of peripheral circulatory insufficiency, with good results in cases of chronic occlusive peripheral arterial diseases (Desandre & Coudrec 1980, Galley & De Boysson 1981, Cloarec 1976, Balas & Pagratis 1981, Trubestein & Duong 1981) and of microcirculatory disorders (Fagrell & Hermansson 1980, Courlier, Bergeron & Fouque 1981). Its mechanism of action has not yet been completely elucidated; recently, however, Dormandy and Ernst (1981) have reported that individual venous infusion with Buflomedil caused a marked improvement in red blood cell deform ability, studied with a filtration method, in ten patients with lower limb ischaemia. This suggests that Buflomedil also has an haemorheologic effect. It is a known fact that patients with diabetes are often affected by vascular diseases, both macroand microcirculatory, and it is also known that one of the pathogenetic processes of vascular complications in diabetes consists in complex alterations of the blood flow properties (McMillan 1975, Calwell et al 1979), comprising mainly an increase in blood and plasma viscosity and alterations in the deformability and aggregability of the red cells (McMillan 1976, McMillan, Utterback & La Puma 1978, Juhan et al 1978, SchmidSchonbein & Volger 1976). The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of the administration of Buflomedil on the rheologic properties of blood in a group of diabetic patients.