ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Endocrinol.
Sec. Adrenal Endocrinology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fendo.2025.1558837
Short-term longitudinal clinical, biochemical, and quality of life outcomes of medical or surgical therapy in unilateral primary aldosteronism
Provisionally accepted- 1Department of Endocrinology, Metabolism, Rheumatology and Nephrology, Faculty of Medicine, Oita University, Yufu, Japan
- 2Faculty of Medicine, Oita University, Yufu, Oita, Japan
- 3Faculty of Welfare and Health Sciences, Oita University, Oita, Japan
- 4Geriatric Nursing, Department of Nursing, Faculty of Medicine, Oita University, Yufu, Japan
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Context: Unilateral primary aldosteronism (uPA) is a surgically curable form of hypertension, frequently associated with resistant hypertension and cerebro-cardiovascular complications. Primary aldosteronism (PA) also negatively affects quality of life (QOL). Objective: This study sought to compare the efficacy of mineralocorticoid receptor antagonists (MRAs) and adrenalectomy (ADX) in the treatment of patients with uPA over time within the same patients and to evaluate the efficacy of MRAs in patients with bilateral PA (bPA). Methods: Subtype diagnosis of PA was based on adrenal vein sampling results. Clinical parameters, including blood pressure, serum potassium (K), active renin concentration (ARC), aldosterone levels, estimated glomerular filtration rate, and Medical Outcomes Study 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) scores, were investigated before and after MRA treatment in all PA patients, as well as after ADX in patients with uPA. Results: The study included 56 patients with bPA and 20 patients with uPA. Changes in parameters with MRA treatment were similar between patients with and without uPA, except for a greater increase in K in patients with uPA. Among patients with uPA, systolic blood pressure and K improved with MRA treatment and showed further improvement following ADX. Diastolic blood pressure and ARC also improved following MRA treatment, with no significant differences observed compared to ADX. SF-36 scores showed no improvement with MRA treatment, but significantly improved after ADX. Conclusion: The findings showed that ADX generally provides superior clinical, biochemical, and QOL outcomes compared to MRAs in patients with uPA.
Keywords: Adrenalectomy, Hypertension, Mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist, primary aldosteronism, Quality of Life
Received: 11 Jan 2025; Accepted: 07 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Yoshida, Sada, Matsuo, Nagai, Matsuda, Noguchi, Yonezu, Imaishi, Morita, Mori, Miyamoto, Ozeki, Gotoh, Masaki and Shibata. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Hirotaka Shibata, Department of Endocrinology, Metabolism, Rheumatology and Nephrology, Faculty of Medicine, Oita University, Yufu, Japan
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