Renovascular hypertension: ten years' experience in a regional centre

In a unit serving a population of three million, 60 hypertensive patients with renovascular disease were identified over a 10-year period. The presence of renovascular disease was usually suggested by intravenous urography (IVU), although this was falsely negative in 21 per cent of cases; isotope renography (IR) was normal in a similar proportion of patients (25 per cent). Eight patients were treated medically and 52 underwent surgical procedures; nephrectomy in 32, autotransplantation in 10, by pass graft in six and percutaneous transluminal angioplasty in four. Twenty-three per cent of patients were cured, 37 per cent improved and 40 per cent unchanged one year after surgery, but the response could not be accurately predicted. Clinical features were of some value in that those patients most likely to benefit from surgery were younger, had less severe hypertension of shorter duration, smoked less, had less severe retinopathy and less cardiomegaly. There was also a trend for those with better renal function and less electrocardiographic evidence of left ventricular hypertrophy to benefit from surgery. The IVU and IR did not predict response to surgery but arteriographic appearances of fibromuscular dysplasia indicated there should be a favourable response. The renal vein renin ratio, basal or stimulated, was of no prognostic value since approximately two-thirds of patients with ratios above or below the threshold value had some benefit from surgery. We conclude that the surgical treatment of renovascular hypertension is worthwhile but the number of patients suitable for surgery is small. Clinical features and the results of simple investigations provided the best guide to surgical outcome in our patients.