Assessment of nitrogen radicals and their scavenging activity in patients with end-stage renal failure.

Reactive oxygen species are implicated in cardiovascular disease in patients with chronic renal failure (CRF). This study is aimed to assess the nitrogen radicals in patients with end-stage renal failure (ESRF) referred for peritoneal dialysis. A total of 36 patients with estimated creatinine clearance ≤ 15 mL/min were recruited from the Dialysis Unit at Al-Yarmouk Teaching Hospital in Baghdad, Iraq during 2009, and enrolled into the study. The main causes of CRF were hypertension and diabetes mellitus. The median levels of serum nitric oxide and peroxynitrite were 300 and 152 μmol, respectively. Nitric oxide was not detected in the sera of 10 patients. The sera of 12 patients showed ability to scavenge in vitro, the nitric oxide released by sodium nitroprusside. Significant inverse correlation was found between serum peroxynitrite and either systolic (r = -0.402) or diastolic (r = -0.387) blood pressure. Our study shows that production of nitrogen radicals is enhanced in ESRF and it is accompanied by limited activity of scavenging nitric oxide.