Renal dopamine receptors are involved in the development of cardiac hypertrophy.

The present study examined the effect of fenoldopam, a known dopamine-1 receptor (DA1) agonist in order to understand its involvement in the cardiac hypertrophic process. Male Sprague-Dawley rats underwent abdominal aortic constriction (AB) with placement of a suprarenal ligature while sham operated animals served as controls. The AB groups showed an increase in their heart wt, left ventricular (LV) wt, heart wt/body wt and LV wt/body ratio. Furthermore, the length of these hearts, as measured from the auriculoventricular border to the apex, LV wall and interventricular (IV) septal thickness were increased from control levels. Treatment with SCH 23390, a DA1 antagonist, on the other hand, was able to partially regress the cardiac hypertrophic changes. All these parameters were also increased in control animals treated with fenoldopam (F). Such changes were more striking in the F+AB group which showed a significant acceleration of the cardiac hypertrophic process on superimposing the two treatments. Plasma dopamine and renin activity were increased in all the groups as compared to control. These results indicate that dopamine receptors are implicated in the development of cardiac hypertrophy.