Effect of intensive physical loads on renal function

: The purpose of the study was to evaluate the extent of renal functional disorders, developing in response to muscular exercise of varying intensity and duration in 64 professional athletes, aged 17 to 26 years. Comparative characteristics of 131I-hippuran kinetics through the urinary tract both at rest and after "acute" (single) and chronic (many years') physical exercise are obtained. There was a direct relationship between effective renal blood flow and the magnitude of muscular exercise. It is demonstrated that post-exercise renal changes disappear without trace, while individuals, exposed to extreme muscular stress for long periods of time, i.e. the professional athletes, may develop irreversible functional changes. Impaired renal function can hardly be attributed to the emergence of yet another compensatory mechanism, for such notions as 'compensation' and "persistent impairement of functional potentials of an organ" are mutually exclusive.