In this study, we hypothesized that blunting of the natriuresis response to intracerebroventricularly (i.c.v.) microinjected cholinergic and adrenergic agonists is involved in the development of hypertension in spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR). We evaluated the effect of i.c.v. injection of cholinergic and noradrenergic agonists, at increasing concentrations, and of muscarinic cholinergic and α1 and α2-adrenoceptor antagonists on blood pressure and urinary sodium handling in SHR, compared with age-matched Wistar Kyoto rats (WR). We confirmed that CCh and NE microinjected into the lateral ventricle (LV) of conscious rats leads to enhanced natriuresis. This response was associated with increased proximal and post-proximal sodium excretion accompanied by an unchanged rate of glomerular filtration. We showed that cholinergic-induced natriuresis in WR and SHR was attenuated by previous i.c.v. administration of atropine and was significantly lower in the hypertensive strain than in WR. In both groups the natriuretic effect of injection of noradrenaline into the LV was abolished by previous local injection of an α1-adrenoceptor antagonist (prazosin). Conversely, LV α2-adrenoceptor antagonist (yohimbine) administration potentiated the action of noradrenaline. The LV yohimbine pretreatment normalized urinary sodium excretion in SHR compared with age-matched WR. In conclusion, these are, as far as we are aware, the first results showing the importance of interaction of central cholinergic and/or noradrenergic receptors in the pathogenesis of spontaneous hypertension. These experiments also provide good evidence of the existence of a central adrenergic mechanism consisting of α1 and α2-adrenoceptors which works antagonistically on regulation of renal sodium excretion.

The non-recovery of renal function after the relief of obstruction in human obstructive renal failure is associated with older age and decreased renal cortical thickness. The complete renal recovery improves patient survival despite malignancy.

Speculatively, it may be suggested that one of the renal sensory nerve signal defects associated with decreased kidney energy generation, induced by kidney ablation, may result in an inability to control the body temperature.

Thermogenesis results from the cellular metabolism and has a fundamental role for body thermoregulation in endothermic species. The motivation for this work is the analysis of the kidneys' contribution for thermoregulation. An inverse problem is solved for the estimation of the heat generation rate that results from the metabolic activities in the kidney, by using transient temperature measurements of the urine. The Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method is applied for the solution of the inverse problem, which presents inherent difficulties associated with low sensitivity of the parameters of main interest that represent the transient heat source term and strong correlation of the remaining model parameters. Such difficulties are dealt with in this work by using a version of the Metropolis‐Hastings algorithm that samples the parameters in blocks. Simulated temperature measurements are used for the inverse problem solution, and the convergence of the Markov chains is verified with two different techniques.

Resumo: Introdução: Avaliar habilidades clínicas é um desafio no curso médico. A heterogeneidade na escolha dos pacientes somada à falta de critérios objetivos resultou em mudança metodológica para utilização do Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE). Objetivo: O objetivo deste estudo foi identificar se o OSCE resulta em distribuição de frequência de notas de desempenho de padrão gaussiano em comparação ao modelo tradicional. Método: Analisaram-se as notas de 239 estudantes da disciplina de Semiologia e Propedêutica de um curso de Medicina entre 2016 (modelo tradicional) e 2017 (OSCE) pelos testesKolmogorov-Smirnovbidimensional e t de Student para verificar a correlação delas com o coeficiente de rendimento (CR). Resultados: As notas da prova no modelo tradicional (p < 0,0001; KS = 0,1881) estão mais distantes da normalidade do que as da prova do modelo OSCE (p = 0,0010; KS = 0,1134) e são mais correlatas com o CR (p < 0,0001; r = 0,45) do que no modelo OSCE (p = 0,31; r = 0,06). Conclusão: O OSCE pode proporcionar informações mais fidedignas sobre o desempenho do estudante em estágios práticos do curso médico.