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Louis C. Johnston, MD
Grant Hospital Chicago

JAMA. 1975;232(2):135.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.—

I enjoyed the timely note of Victor Vertes that helpfully summarized the current clinical status of plasma renin determinations (230:1279, 1974). I believe a few clarifying or precautionary comments are in order. Minoxidil does not inhibit renin, but stimulates its release.¹

While renin assay has epochally expanded our understanding of hypertensive pathophysiology, its use as a risk marker of premature arteriopathy in human hypertension has been very seriously questioned and is unconfirmed by most recent studies.² A cautious and carefully controlled study,³ based on earlier animal experimentation relating the triad of hyperreninism, hyperaldosteronism, and hypertension to unique severe angiopathy, led to nine clinical subgroupings based on renin vs aldosterone: high, low, or normal, and each with varying amounts of serious vascular disease. Any grouping, however, purporting a specific that is importantly related to hypertensive morbidity but found in a smaller percentage of blacks than . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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