Urinary Albumin Excretion Rate: Diagnostic and Prognostic Utility in Essential Hypertension.

Context : To evaluate the usefulness of urinary albumin excretion rate (UAER) i.e. Albumin/Creatinine Ratio (ACR) in diagnosis and prognosis of essential hypertension (EHT). Objectives : To find out the association of urinary albumin excretion rate with the pathophysiology of essential hypertension. Study Design : A cross-sectional analytical study. Materials & Methods : Urinary albumin excretion (UAE), urinary creatinine (UC) and UAER were analyzed and compared between hypertensive cases and age & sex matched normotensive controls of age group 30-65 years using unpaired two-tailed Student ‘t’ test. All statistical analyses were done with PASW (SPSS) v.18.0. Results : Systolic BP (SBP) and diastolic BP (DBP) of cases were found to be significantly higher (p < 0.001) than controls. Urine MAlb level (p < 0.001) and ACR (p < 0.001) in cases were significantly higher compared to controls. Correlation studies showed that SBP and DBP was significantly positively correlated with urine MAlb (SBP: r = 0.859, DBP: r = 0.733; p < 0.001) and ACR (SBP: r = 0.830, DBP: r = 0.739; p < 0.001). Sex-wise comparison in cases revealed that males had statistically non-significant (p > 0.05) lower levels of urine MAlb as compared to females but had significantly higher (p < 0.001) levels of urine creatinine and lower (p < 0.001) ACR compared to females. Conclusion: Urinary MAlb levels and ACR are seen to be increased in hypertensive subjects compared to normotensive subjects. ACR was significantly higher in female hypertensives than males which can be credited to the physiologically observed lower urine creatinine levels compared to males. Both Microalbuminuria and ACR can serve as specific and well-established marker of cardiovascular and renal damage in EHT.

Effect of Zinc Salts on Acid Secretion and Peptic Ulceration in Albino Rats.

The present study was carried out to see the effect of two zinc salts i.e zinc sulphate and zinc chloride on gastric ulcers induced by stress, pylorus ligation and aspirin in albino rats. The rats were divided into two main groups (zinc sulphate 30, 60, 90 mg/kg i.p and zinc chloride 10 and 20mg/kg i.p). They were further sub-divided into three sub-groups dependant on ulcer model i.e stress, pylorus ligation and aspirin induced ulcers. It was found that zinc sulphate and zinc chloride had a dose dependant reduction in ulcer index in all three models of gastric ulceration. Also, both the salts had anti acid secretory effect, raised pH of gastric secretion and reduced total acidity significantly. Thus zinc salts prevent gastric ulceration. Probably this effect is mediated by anti acid secretory action.