Sex and parental hypertension as predictors of worsened red blood cell membrane enzyme activities in type 1 insulin-dependent diabetic subjects.

The possibility that distinct genetic factors may concur, in association with diabetes, to increase susceptibility to vascular morbidity, including hypertension, has been evaluated in ninety-four normotensive insulin-dependent diabetic patients by testing both the frequency and prevalence of hypertension in parents and by measuring membrane red blood cell enzyme activities. Parental hypertension was present in a significantly higher proportion of diabetic compared to control subjects. A significant decrease in basal membrane red blood cell (Na(+)-K+), (Mg2+) and (Ca2+) ATPase activities was also related to the disease and was apparently uninfluenced by short--or long term metabolic control. In contrast with what was observed in the control group, sex caused in diabetic subjects significant variations in red blood cell enzyme activities, with women showing the lowest mean basal values of all enzyme activities. Parental hypertension turned out to be an independent risk factor in significantly reducing red blood cell enzyme activities both in diabetic and control subjects. However, whereas in diabetic subjects sex interacted strongly with parental hypertension in causing reduction of enzyme activities, in controls the effect of parental hypertension was sex-independent and significantly reduced basal enzyme activities, thus rendering subjects similar to diabetics. It is concluded that both sex and parental hypertension in association with diabetes, are predictors of further damage to red blood cell enzyme activities, which may thus be linked to increased risk of susceptibility towards vascular complications.