Blood-Brain Barrier Dysfunction in Acute Arterial Hypertension Induced by Clamping of the Thoracic Aorta

Acute experimental hypertension induced by clamping of the thoracic aorta resulted in blood-brain barrier dysfunction as revealed by extravasation of Evans blue-albumin in 10 out of 13 dogs. The tracer distribution was similar to that found in animals with metaraminol-induced hypertension, which supports the hypothesis that the high intravascular pressure per se and not any toxic drug effect is the factor that brings about increased permeability to protein tracers.