Free Republic

Researchers have found that the cause of a common type of high blood pressure originates in a tiny benign nodule, present in one-in-twenty people with hypertension. The nodule produces a hormone, aldosterone, that controls how much salt is in the body. The new discovery is a gene variant in some of these nodules which leads to a vast but intermittent overproduction of the hormone. The variant affects a protein called CADM1 and stops cells in the body from "talking" to each other and saying that it is time to stop making aldosterone. An issue for doctors is the fluctuating release...

Researchers found that patients who were assigned to the highest dose of the new medication saw the top blood pressure number drop by a full 20 points. Some patients with high blood pressure can't get it under control with standard medications, but a new study shows an experimental drug is up to the task of treating these tough-to-treat cases. Why do some folks struggle more with managing their high blood pressure than others? When the hypertension is caused by the hormone aldosterone, which is responsible for how much salt the body retains, it is much harder to control, researchers explained....