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Vasopressin: the missing link for preeclampsia?
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Vasopressin: the missing link for preeclampsia?

Jeremy A Sandgren, Sabrina M Scroggins, Donna A Santillan, Eric J Devor, Katherine N Gibson-Corley, Gary L Pierce, Curt D Sigmund, Mark K Santillan and Justin L Grobe
American journal of physiology. Regulatory, integrative and comparative physiology, Vol.309(9), pp.R1062-R1064
11/01/2015
DOI: 10.1152/ajpregu.00073.2015
PMCID: PMC4666952
PMID: 25810383
url
https://doi.org/10.1152/ajpregu.00073.2015View
Published (Version of record) Open Access

Abstract

Preeclampsia is a devastating cardiovascular disorder of late pregnancy, affecting 5-7% of all pregnancies and claiming the lives of 76,000 mothers and 500,000 children each year. Various lines of evidence support a "tissue rejection" type reaction toward the placenta as the primary initiating event in the development of preeclampsia, followed by a complex interplay among immune, vascular, renal, and angiogenic mechanisms that have been implicated in the pathogenesis of preeclampsia beginning around the end of the first trimester. Critically, it remains unclear what mechanism links the initiating event and these pathogenic mechanisms. We and others have now demonstrated an early and sustained increase in maternal plasma concentrations of copeptin, a protein by-product of arginine vasopressin (AVP) synthesis and release, during preeclampsia. Furthermore, chronic infusion of AVP during pregnancy is sufficient to phenocopy essentially all maternal and fetal symptoms of preeclampsia in mice. As various groups have demonstrated interactions between AVP and immune, renal, and vascular systems in the nonpregnant state, elevations of this hormone are therefore positioned both in time (early pregnancy) and function to contribute to preeclampsia. We therefore posit that AVP represents a missing mechanistic link between initiating events and established midpregnancy dysfunctions that cause preeclampsia.
Pregnancy Water-Electrolyte Imbalance - metabolism Arginine Vasopressin - metabolism Models, Biological Humans Female Pre-Eclampsia - metabolism Glycopeptides - metabolism

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