Age-dependent salt hypertension in Brattleboro rats: a hemodynamic analysis.

The hemodynamic effects of 0.6% saline, consumed either from youth (4th week of age) or from adulthood (12th week of age), were studied in unanesthetized, unoperated, and uninephrectomized homozygous female Brattleboro rats. Long-term saline drinking induced a general decrease of blood pressure in unoperated rats which was more pronounced in rats drinking it from youth. The relation of low systemic resistance and high cardiac output (observed at the age of 10-15 weeks) to the high mortality of these rats was discussed. Two phases were recognized in the development of salt hypertension in uninephrectomized rats drinking saline from youth. The increased systemic resistance played a major role during the early phase (13-15 weeks), while changes of body fluids as well as altered arterial compliance contributed to the elevation of systolic blood pressure in the late phase of salt hypertension (20-30 weeks of age). In uninephrectomized rats drinking saline from adulthood, the late blood pressure response was only slightly attenuated in comparison with uninephrectomized rats drinking saline from youth. The absence of increased arterial rigidity in the former group was the only major hemodynamic difference between these two groups of uninephrectomized rats aged 20-30 weeks.