Endocrine Abstracts

Objective: Primary aldosteronism (PA) is the first cause of endocrine hypertension accounting for about 6% of all cases of hypertension. According to international guidelines, PA screening is based on plasma aldosterone-to-renin concentration ratio (ARR) computation. Nevertheless, measurement of urine aldosterone excretion may be of interest since it integrates aldosterone secretion over 24 hours. However, available urine aldosterone immuno-assays have poor specificity.<p ...

Introduction: Primary aldosteronism (PA) is the most frequent form of secondary hypertension. Over the past 10 years, important discoveries have been made regarding the genetic basis of aldosterone producing adenoma and familial forms of primary aldosteronism. In most cases, genetic abnormalities are found in genes coding for ion channels (KCNJ5, CACNA1D, CACNA1H, CLCN2) and pumps (ATP1A1, ATP2B3). These mutations affect intracellular ion homeostasis and/or c...