Management of human placental arterioles
This study was approved by the Clinical Trial Ethics Committee of the
Affiliated Hospital of Southwest Medical University (registration
number: KY2019039). All work was undertaken according the provisions of
the Declaration of Helsinki. All patients signed informed consent for
specimen collection. Ten single pregnant women diagnosed with
severe preeclampsia were selected as
the experimental group (SP), and 10 single pregnant women with
normotensive pregnancy were chosen as the control group (NP). All
patients were hospitalized and delivered by either vaginal delivery or
cesarean section in the Department of Obstetrics in our hospital from
May 2020 to May 2021. Inclusion criteria for the SP group were based on
the American College of ObstetriciansĀ and Gynecologists (ACOG)
Guidelines[12]. All subjects were excluded from
the study if they had chronic hypertension, kidney disease,
cardio-cerebrovascular disease, severe liver and kidney function
impairment, other basic diseases, systemic diseases or other pregnancy
complications. Patients who had histories of smoking, alcohol abuse,
syphilis, hepatitis virus and human immunodeficiency virus were also
excluded. We collected patient
demographic and clinical characteristics, such as maternal
age, gestational age and blood
pressure (Table 1). After the placenta was delivered, the fetal membrane
was immediately stripped under sterile conditions, and 3-5 pieces of
placental tissue with small placental arterioles near the edge of the
placenta, approximately 4*1*1 cm3 in size, were
extracted and placed in the prepared specimen box, which was immediately
transferred to the laboratory under low temperature. Then, the
perivascular connective tissue was rapidly and gently removed under a
microscope, taking care to minimize the damage to the blood vessels, and
vessels with diameters of approximately 0.1-0.2 cm and lengths of
approximately 2-3 cm were separated. Some of the isolated blood vessels
were frozen in liquid nitrogen and then quickly transferred to a freezer
at -80 °C for cryopreservation, and these samples were used for
subsequent PCR and Western blot analyses. The rest were fixed in 4%
paraformaldehyde, and the specimens were used for subsequent HE staining
and immunohistochemical analysis.