Spontaneous remission of hypertension in awake rats chronically exposed to shaker stress.

Hypertension was induced experimentally by subjecting rats to vigorous shaking, 4 hours (at random) daily for 14 weeks. Systolic pressures measured with the tail-cuff method began to rise after the first week and were significantly elevated on Weeks 3, 4, 6, 7, and 8, but reverted to normotensive levels thereafter despite continued shaking. A similar hypertension was then induced in another group of rats and when spontaneous remission occurred, pressor responsiveness was tested on the eleventh week by recording aortic pressures from indwelling catheters. Pressor responses to further shaking or electrical stimulation of the anterior hypothalamus were smaller in shaker-stressed than in control rats, while those to injected norepinephrine were almost the same in both groups. Spike potentials recorded from postganglionic sympathetic (splanchnic) nerves showed higher baselines but smaller increases in neural firing during hypothalamic stimulation in shaker-stressed than in control rats. These results suggest that while shaker stress alone can induce hypertension, the resulting blood pressure elevation is not sustained, perhaps because adaptation within the central nervous system concurrently reduces pressor responsiveness.