ALTERATIONS IN RENAL FUNCTION, INCLUDING HEMATURIA, IN MAN DURING INTRACRANIAL AIR STUDIES

Abstract

THE QUESTION of the relationship between the central nervous system and the kidney is of great significance and involves not only somatic vasomotor and endocrine shifts in water balance 1 but possibilities in nephritis as well. In previous experiments on the unanesthetized dog, purely central nervous stimuli, osmotic, alkaloidal and hormonal, were shown²to produce drastic alterations in renal function, including albuminuria and hematuria. The clinical experiments hereafter detailed attempt primarily to demonstrate whether analogous changes occur in man following a purely central nervous stimulus. The evidence for direct relationship between brain and heart has been previously summarized,³and electrocardiographic changes after pneumoencephalography have been demonstrated.⁴In our patients studied by ventriculography and pneumoencephalography electrocardiographic analyses were coincidentally obtained. The occasional occurrence of an oliguria following ventriculography and encephalography leads one to believe that a direct relationship may exist between central nervous stimulation and total suppression of