Aspirin and dipyridamole have frequently failed to control intimal hyperplasia in vascular grafts in animal and clinical trials. These trials were based on the concept that the smooth muscle mitogen, platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) released from platelets, was a major cause of intimal hyperplasia. Both endothelial and smooth muscle cells (ECs and SMCs), however, can also release PDGF-like SMC mitogens that might cause intimal hyperplasia. We therefore tested whether aspirin and dipyridamole alone or together can affect PDGF-A chain mRNA levels in cultured human saphenous vein ECs and SMCs. Cultures were exposed for 72 hours to 3 x 10(-5) mol/L aspirin and/or 5 x 10(-6) mol/L dipyridamole. Cellular RNA was then extracted, and PDGF-A chain mRNA signal levels were measured by a reverse transcription/polymerase chain reaction method. mRNA for glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase was used as a constitutively expressed control RNA species. Signal strength on Southern blots of amplified polymerase chain reaction products was measured by densitometry. Neither aspirin nor dipyridamole alone or together reduced the ratio (PDGF-A chain signal/glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase signal) below that of control cultures. PDGF-A chain expression was not a constitutive artifact of culture because dibutyryl cyclic AMP (5 x 10(-4) mol/L) reduced PDGF-A chain signal from a control index of 1.0 to 0.5 +/- 0.1 (mean +/- SE) (n = 3; p less than 0.05) in EC cultures and to 0.2 (mean) (n = 2) in SMC cultures. These data may explain why aspirin and dipyridamole fail to reduce intimal hyperplasia in some animal and clinical trials despite effective inhibition of platelet aggregation.