Decompensated benign nephrosclerosis and secondary malignant nephrosclerosis.

Using semiquantitative morphometric methods, the clinical picture of decompensated benign nephrosclerosis is distinguished from that of secondary malignant nephrosclerosis, designated as the consequence of high pressure. It is shown that hypertensive glomerulopathy triggered by high pressure and postglomerular interstitial fibrosis with tubular atrophy are in the foreground of pathologic changes in decompensated benign nephrosclerosis, whereas the preglomerular vessel network is most often affected in secondary malignant nephrosclerosis. The preglomerular vascular lesions in secondary malignant nephrosclerosis lead to such heavy stenosis of the afferent vessels that the clinical picture of hypertensive glomerulopathy is rarely observed, while that of ischemic glomerular capillary collapse is frequent. The preferred affliction of the glomeruli and the postglomerular vessel network leads in decompensated benign nephrosclerosis to severe interstitial fibrosis, which has a pyramidal form, decreasing from the base of the pyramid at the corticomedullary boundary to the outer renal cortex. In secondary malignant nephrosclerosis fibrosis of the renal cortical interstitium is homogeneous in all layers of the renal cortex. Clinically, decompensated benign nephrosclerosis and secondary malignant nephrosclerosis, which occur predominantly in young to middle-aged males, manifest malignant hypertension. They are also accompanied by progressive renal insufficiency.