Morphological criteria of the state of the microcirculation and of the lymphatic drainage in the synovial membrane of the knee joint under normal and pathological conditions
Using transmission electron microscopy, the ultrastructural organization of the endothelium of blood and lymphatic capillaries and the structures of the interstitium of synovial membrane were studied in the patients with osteoarthrosis of a knee joint of I-II and II-III stages. Material, obtained from the patients with traumatic lesions of the knee joint components, was used as a control. The structural signs indicative of the microcirculation and lymphatic drainage disturbances were detected in the synovial membrane and were most expressed in II-III stages of osteoarthrosis. These included: the decrease of the volumetric density of all the types of micropinocytotic vesicles and the cisterns of rough endoplasmic reticulum, the decrease of the numerical density of attached and free polysomal ribosomes, the accumulation of erythrocytes and thrombocytes in the lumen of blood capillaries, the increase of the number of open-type interendotheliocyte contacts in the lymph capillaries, the increase of the size and the decrease of the electron density of the pericapillary and the interstitial spaces.