[Are clotting disorders a pathogenetic factor in nephrosclerosis and hypertension? (author's transl)]

The clinical course of the haemolytic-uraemic syndrome in four patients suggests that hypertension may result from it. The morphological changes in the kidney are those of primary malignant nephrosclerosis. Hypercoagulability is thought to be an important pathogenetic factor in the development of the disease. But irreversible renal failure is not, contrary to typical primary malignant nephrosclerosis, an inevitable sequel. Abortive forms with predominant involvement of glomerular vessels have a more favourable prognosis than those forms with additional preglomerular vascular changes, in which a more or less marked impairment of renal function and hypertension persists. These forms are of particular interest because they indicate a renal pathogenetic mechanism of chronic hypertension. The described observations--taken together with those on the pathogenesis of hypertension caused by oral contraceptives--provide a pointer to the importance of clotting disorders in the initiation and development of some forms of hypertension.