Influence of electronically paced ventricular rate on urine flow and excretion of minerals in patients with total heart block.

Patients with total heart block may present with congestive heart failure and considerable oedema which may be corrected by use of an electronic pacemaker (Muller and Bellet, 1961; DeSanctis, 1963; Schliler, Tryding, and Westling, 1964; Friedberg et al., 1965).These observations suggest some relation between paced rate and the renal excretion of minerals and water.In a preliminary study (Dekker et al., 1963) in a single patient with total heart block, renal excretion of sodium, water, and chloride was greater during an electronically induced heart rate of 100 a minute than at a rate of 50 a minute.Recent studies seem to indicate, however, that in patients with total heart block the sodium excretion is decreased in response to an acute increase in heart rate (Humphries et al., 1967).In this report the urine flow and renal excretion of minerals and water at different paced heart rates are therefore re-examined in some detail.the method of Jaffe in the modification of de Vries and