High plasma concentration of brain natriuretic peptide in patients with ruptured anterior communicating artery aneurysm.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the mechanism of increased atrial natriuretic peptide (ANP) and brain natriuretic peptide (BNP) in patients with subarachnoid hemorrhage due to ruptured aneurysms. ANP and BNP plasma concentrations were measured by immunoradiometoric assay in 53 patients at the day of onset of ruptured aneurysm, the correlation between values of increased ANP or BNP, and sex, age, location of ruptured aneurysm, degree of SAH, and severity of WFNS were statistically studied. The concentration of BNP in ruptured anterior communicating artery aneurysm (A-com) shows a significant elevation compared with other site aneurysms (p = 0.0007). The patients classified as WFNS Grade V, show a significantly higher concentration of BNP, compared with the patients classified as Grade I-IV (p =0.01). It is concluded that the hypersecretion of BNP, but not ANP, is caused by direct mechanical damage at the anterior hypothalamus by ruptured A-com aneurysm and a higher increase of BNP is also observed in cases suffering from severe neurological deficit.