Abstract:
Hypertension is considered as a multifactorial disorder in which a numerous of physiological mechanism take
part to raise blood pressure The present study is carried out to study the serum and red blood cell electrolytes
disturbances in men and women patients of essential hypertension. The samples for analysis were obtained from two hundred four (204) age and sex matched volunteers (51 men and 51 women normotensive, 51 men and 51 women hypertensive). Erythrocytes obtained from blood samples (freshly drawn), washed and processed for the estimation of Na+ and K+ concentrations through flame photometer. Biochemical estimations were done by flame photometery and spectrophotometery. Data were analyzed by Two-way ANOVA followed by Newman-Keuls test. Results show the intraerythrocyte sodium levels were significantly higher in essential hypertension patients than normotensive healthy controls. Whereas serum concentrations of sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, phosphorus and intraerythrocyte potassium were significantly smaller in hypertensive patients with respect to normotensive control subjects. Moreover, systolic, diastolic blood pressure and intraerythrocyte sodium were higher while potassium was lower in hypertensive women compared to hypertensive men. From a clinical point of view, an inverse correlation was found between systolic
blood pressure values and serum Na+ , K+ , Ca2+ and Mg2+ in the sample of essential hypertensive patients. No sex related differences were observed in serum electrolytes in normal individual and patients of essential hypertension. The results reported here suggest that serum magnesium and its interactions with monovalent cations e.g. sodium, potassium, phosphorus, RBC sodium and RBC potassium and divalent cations like calcium are the main responsible ions for the pathogenesis of hypertension. Intraerythrocyte levels of sodium perform an important role in the greater vulnerability of male sex to develop hypertension.
