Variation in small bowel length: factor in achieving total enteroscopy?
Length of the small bowel in humans is pertinent to advances in deep enteroscopy and existing surgical applications such as intestinal bypass and prevention of short gut syndrome. If average small bowel length varies with height, total enteroscopy may be easier to achieve in patients who are short in stature.
The renal nerves mediate the increase of renin and nNOS mRNA during sodium restriction, while the suppression of nNOS and renin gene expression during a sodium load is independent of the presence of the renal nerves. The parallel changes in renin and nNOS mRNA during different sodium intakes suggest that nNOS can be part of the complex, and still largely unclarified, macula densa mechanism of renin regulation.