الفهرس 
acknowledgmentOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Portal hypertension is commonly present in patients with hepatic schistosomiasis . It has been attributed to mechanical obstruction to the portal blood flow .
Many other factors were suggested to be contributing in the production of portal hypertension e.g. hypervolaemia , catecholamines and secondary hyperaldosteronism .
The present work aimed at studying catecholamine levels as well as renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system in patients with bilharzial hepatic fibrosis and portal hypertension both in systemic and portal blood samples .
The material of this work consisted of fifteen normal control subjects and twenty patient3 with bilharzial hepatic fibrosis and portal hypertension . The bilharzial nature of the disease was confirmed by needle biopsy of the liver .
All subjects were subjected to thorough clinical
examination . Mixed venous and portal blood samples were
collected from the fasting subjcts for the following-
assays : >
- A battery of laboratory investigations to assess the
- Plasma catecholamines ( epinephrine , norepinephrine and dopamine ) were assayed using HPLC after being adsorbed by alumina , then eluted off using dilute ’acid . The eluate was injected onto reversed phase column. Catecholamines were oxidized in the electrochemical detector liberating electrons which create a measurable current . The current is translated into a peak by the recorder . The peak height is proportional to catecholamine concentration which can be calculated from a standard curve .
- Plasma renin activity , angiotensin I and aldosterone were assayed by radioimmunoassay , the priciple of which is competition between radio-labelled compound and that in the sample to be assayed , for a fixed and limited number of antibody binding sites . The amount of labelled compound bound to the antibody , counted using gamma counter , is inversely related to its amount the sample .
The results of the present study revealed :
- Significant increase of catecholamines , renin angiotensins and aldosterone in the portal blood than the systemic blood of both control subjects and bilharzial patients ’
- Significant increase of catecholamines , renin angiotensins and aldosterone in the systemic and portal blood of the bilharzial patients than the corresponding control values .