Studies of red cell cation transport in white and black essential hypertensives

Abstract

Summary It has been reported previously in white patients with essential hypertension that red cell sodium pump activity as measured by ouabain-sensitive uptake of the potassium analogue 86Rb from a potassium-free medium, is very significantly greater than in white controls. In a further study of black (West Indian) subjects reported here no similar abnormality was present in black hypertensives when compared with black normotensive individuals. Red cell rubidium uptake was significantly lower in normotensive blacks than in normotensive whites although sodium pump activity was the same. These results may be relevant to observed racial differences in sodium handling and in the pathophysiology of essential hypertension.