Psychosomatic Medicine Faster Service from Outside North America
HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by McCubbin, J. A.
Right arrow Articles by Williams, R. B.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by McCubbin, J. A.
Right arrow Articles by Williams, R. B., Jr

Psychosomatic Medicine, Vol 50, Issue 1 8-14, Copyright © 1988 by American Psychosomatic Society

ORIGINAL ARTICLES

Opioid dysfunction and risk for hypertension: naloxone and blood pressure responses during different types of stress

JA McCubbin, RS Surwit and RB Williams Jr
Department of Psychiatry, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710.

Opioidergic inhibition of sympathetic nervous system responses may be deficient in persons at risk for essential hypertension (McCubbin et al: Hypertension 7:808, 1985). The opiate antagonist naloxone increases blood pressure responses during psychological stress in young adults with low causal blood pressure, but has no pressor effect in subjects with high casual blood pressure. The purpose of the present study was to determine the role of altered baroreflex function in the abnormal pressor effect of naloxone in persons at risk for hypertension development. We tested this by comparison of the effects of naloxone on responses to psychological stress with responses to orthostatic stress in persons with high and low casual blood pressure. The results suggest that abnormal opioidergic control of systolic blood pressure responses to psychological stress is not likely a result of altered baroreflex function. Persons at risk for hypertension show evidence of an opioid peptide lesion that can probably be localized either at the adrenal medullae or at levels of central autonomic control that are parallel with or rostral to baroreflex circuits.




HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
Copyright © 1988 by the American Psychosomatic Society