Cardiotoxic effects of hypercatecholemia in renal insufficiency.

Renal insufficiency is regularly accompanied by an increase of the total catecholamines of the blood. Adrenolytic drugs, which inactivate circulating catecholamines, temporarily improve the abnormal S-T segments and T waves in patients with renal insufficiency but not in hypertensive patients without renal complications. It is suggested that in renal insufficiency, the retained circulating catecholamines damage cardiac metabolism and function. In agreement with previous observations, the behavior of the "left ventricular strain pattern" was relatively independent of the blood pressure level.