Prolonged biological half-life of sodium-22 in patients with essential hypertension.

Abstract

IN the treatment of hypertension, the effectiveness of sodium depletion by either dietary restriction or natriuretic agents is now fully documented. It is sufficient to say that the response to such treatment led to the hypothesis that hypertensives might suffer from an abnormality in sodium metabolism. The first measurements of the sodium content of individuals with hypertension were done in 1951 by the technique of isotopic dilution using sodium-241. With the exception of one report these observations have been confirmed repeatedly by ourselves and by others: an increase in sodium was not evident. In the single discordant report2, some cases of severe hypertension were noted to have an increase in exchangeable sodium, but this was interpreted as being secondary rather than primary to the disease, because it was observed almost exclusively in individuals with advanced hypertension.