[Tobacco and arterial pressure (I.). The hormonal changes in a model of acute nicotine overload]

42 persons with normal blood pressure were studied. Only 31 of them were smokers. We did not find any differences in the basal blood pressure, heart rate, ACTH nor cortisol levels, but there were significant differences in the levels of biological markers of tobacco (cotinine and nicotine). When the smokers were induced to smoke 2 cigarettes which had 2.2 mg of nicotine, we observed an increase in the diastolic and systolic blood pressure as well as the heart rate, plasma levels of ACTH (basal: 21.61 +/- 12.52, 10 minutes: 28.06 +/- 21.01, p less than 0.05; 20 minutes: 26.06 +/- 18.56 ng/ml) and cortisol (basal: 14.56 +/- 3.84; 10 minutes: 14.60 +/- 4.7; 20 minutes: 16.55 +/- 6.61 ug/dl, p less than 0.01). At the same time, the nicotine and cotinine levels were significantly higher (p less than 0.0001) and correlated. Our results suggest that apart from the adrenergic response to tobacco exposure, nicotine can produce other hormonal changes which affect the regulating systems of blood pressure. Nicotine and cotinine are the election biological markers to monitor the response to passive or active tobacco smoke inhalation.