A 64-year-old man visited our hospital with complaints of misty vision and ophthalmalgia. On admission, his blood pressure (BP) was high at 220/135 mmHg with no past history of hypertension, and he had choked discs. He was tentatively diagnosed as having idiopathic intracranial hypertension, and was later found to have atherosclerotic unilateral renovascular hypertension (RVH) based upon the extremely high plasma renin activity together with the radiological image tests. On day 3, combined antihypertensive therapies consisting of oral angiotensin II receptor blocker (ARB) and Ca channel blocker (CCB) along with intravenous CCB induced an abrupt BP lowering which led to deterioration of his renal function, progressing into acute kidney injury (AKI). Cessation of the ARB and reduction of the CCB dose ameliorated the AKI-related decline in renal function. On day 17, as he was reluctant to receive surgical intervention, he was treated with a direct renin inhibitor, aliskiren, combined with a half-dose CCB as a maintenance antihypertensive therapy. The therapy has proven not only successful to chronically maintain his renal function but was also capable of controlling his BP in the neighborhood of 130/85 mmHg over a period of 2 years. The present case suggests that the direct renin inhibition with aliskiren can be a safe and useful antihypertensive option to control hypertension and to preserve renal function in patients with atherosclerotic unilateral RVH.
Keywords: Aliskiren; Atherosclerosis; Direct renin inhibitor; Renin angiotensin aldosterone system; Renovascular hypertension.