Renal Artery Stenosis
Medical Author: Siamak Nabili, MD, MPH
Medical Editor: Melissa Conrqad Stöppler, MD
What are the renal arteries?
Renal refers to anything related to the kidneys. Renal arteries carry blood
from the heart to the kidneys. They branch directly from the aorta (the main
artery coming off the heart) on either side and extend to each kidney. These
arteries take a very large volume of blood to the kidneys to be filtered.
The heart pumps out approximately 5 liters of blood per minute, and about
1-1.5 liters (25%) of the total volume of blood pumped by the heart passes
through the kidneys every minute.
What is renal artery stenosis?
Renal artery stenosis (narrowing) is a decrease in the
diameter of the renal arteries. The resulting restriction of blood flow to the
kidneys may lead to impaired kidney function (renal failure) and
high blood
pressure (hypertension), referred to as renovascular hypertension, or RVHT
("reno" for kidney and "vascular" for blood vessel). Renal artery stenosis is a major cause of RVHT and
accounts for 1%-10% of the 50 million cases of hypertension in the United
States.
Renovascular hypertension occurs when the artery to one of the kidneys is
narrowed (unilateral, or one-sided, stenosis), while renal failure occurs when
the arteries to both kidneys are narrowed (bilateral, or two-sided, stenosis).
The decreased blood flow to both kidneys increasingly impairs renal function.
What are the causes of renal artery stenosis?
The majority of renal artery stenosis is caused by atherosclerosis (hardening
and narrowing of blood vessel wall from the inside) similar to the process that
occurs in blood vessels in the heart and other parts of the body.
Risk factors for atherosclerosis include:
Less common causes of renal artery stenosis are
fibromuscular dysplasia of the vessels (narrowing of the vessel due to internal
thickening of the blood vessel wall),
arteritis (inflammation of the blood vessel), or dissection
(tearing and division of the blood vessel wall).
Next: How common is renal artery stenosis? »
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