Abstract 074: Empagliflozin Improves Impaired Sensitivity Of Afferent Neurons With Renal Axons

Afferent renal nerve pathways likely play a role in salt sensitive hypertension. We recently reported that high salt diet (HS) impairs these afferent renal pathways in rats. Now we tested the hypothesis that during HS a decrease in sensitivity of renal afferent neurons is prevented by the SGLT2 inhibitor empagiflozin.Respective groups of rats were put on HS containing 8% NaCl or a normal diet. Two groups (HS, controls) received empagiflozin 20 mg/kg BW/day orally. Renal neurons were retrogradely labeled with DiI. In culture, labeled dorsal root ganglion neurons (DRG Th11-L2) with renal afferents were investigated electrophysiologically using current clamp mode to assess action potential generation during current injection. Neurons were characterized as tonic highly active (> 5 action potentials, AP) and phasic less active neurons (≤ 5 AP upon stimulation. )In neurons from rats on HS, the relation of tonic highly active neurons to less active phasic neurons shifted consistently towards phasic units (63,8% tonic neurons in controls vs. 42%* on HS, *p