Arteriolosclerosis

We used the term arteriolosclerosis to describe the histological changes commonly found in the small vessels of the brain in aging. Histological changes include intimal deterioration, smooth muscle degeneration, and fibrohyalinotic thickening of arterioles with consequent narrowing of the vascular lumen. Lipohyalinosis is sometimes used to describe this change but was originally used to describe vessels that had first undergone fibrinoid change. Because there are no standard guidelines to grade severity of arteriolosclerosis (or lipohylalinosis), we evaluated the vessels of the anterior basal ganglia with a semiquantitative grading system from 0 (none) to 7 (occluded). These levels were compressed into the 4 levels listed below.

Note: The listed reference describes a 6-stage grading system.