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J. Antonio Aldrete, MD; John W. O'Higgins, MB; Thomas E. Starzl, MD, PhD

AMA Arch Surg. 1970;101(1):82-84.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

Electrolyte imbalance is one of the most typical features of terminal renal disease. The serum potassium in particular tends to be elevated, and its level is in itself one of the indications for dialysis in uremic patients.

Although Spergel et al¹ stressed that serum potassium determinations do not represent actual intracellular values, hypokalemia and hyperkalemia are clearly defined entities in clinical practice and produce well-recognized electrocardiographic alterations.^2,3

Since elevations of serum potassium occur during renal transplantation and may produce cardiac arrhythmias,^4-6 a study was undertaken in which determinations of serum potassium were performed hourly throughout these operations. Serum sodium values were simultaneously estimated for comparison.

Method

Included in this study were 12 consecutive male patients undergoing renal homografts from related living donors at the Denver Veterans Administration Hospital. All recipients were premedicated with diazepam, 0.08 mg/kg, and pentazocine hydrochloride, 0.5 mg/kg, intramuscularly. Anesthesia was induced with 2 . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
Denver

From the departments of anesthesiology (Drs. Aldrete and O'Higgins) and surgery (Dr. Starzl), University of Colorado Medical Center, and the Veterans Administration Hospital, Denver.

Footnotes
Accepted for publication March 9, 1970.

Reprint requests to University of Colorado Medical Center, 4200 E Ninth St, Denver 80220 (Dr. Aldrete).

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