Renal Hemodynamics and Tubular Function in Patients With Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Healthy Controls
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2005-11-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Nitrogen-oxide (NO) plays an important role for blood pressure regulation, renal
hemodynamics, and the renal excretion of sodium. NO is synthesized from L-arginine in the
vascular endothelium and have a very short half-life in plasma and is therefore very
difficult to measure directly.
L-mono-methyl-L-arginine (L-NMMA) is an analogue to L-arginine and a competitive inhibitor of
NO, and therefore can be used to study the effect of NO on the circulation. In normal
subjects, infusion of L-NMMA will cause an increase in blood pressure, decreased renal
plasma-flow, decreased glomerular filtration rate, and a decreased excretion of sodium.
Hypothesis: Patients with obstructive sleep apnea has a decreased activity in the NO-system.
This is contributing to the hypertension often seen in these patients. Decreased activity in
the NO-system can be revealed by diminished fall in renal hemodynamic and sodium excretion
after infusion of L-NMMA.