Endothelial dysfunction and panvascular diseases

Vascular endothelial cells are the key cell type responsible for vascular health and homeostasis. Endothelial dysfunction (ED), as the core process of panvascular diseases, is caused by multi-step and multi-risk factors involving endothelial injury, hyperpermeability, vasoconstriction, inflammation, oxidative stress, leukocyte adhesion, metabolic disorder, endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EndMT), and platelet activation. ED plays an important role in cardiovascular, tumor, metabolic, pulmonary, and infectious diseases. Therefore, the assessment of endothelial function is of great importance to clinical diagnosis and therapeutics. In this review, we centered on the relationship between ED and panvascular diseases, and overviewed the research advance of ED and panvascular diseases, with an aim to understanding the novel molecular mechanism of panvascular diseases and accelerating the development of pharmaceuticals targeting ED in panvascular diseases.