Does gender influence human cardiovascular and renal responses to water immersion?

and Peter Norsk. Does gender influence human cardiovas-cular and renal responses to water immersion? J Appl Physiol 89: 621–628, 2000.—We hypothesized that women and men exhibit similar cardiovascular and renal responses to thermoneutral water immersion (WI) to the neck. Ten women and nine men underwent two sessions in random order: 1) seated nonimmersed for 5.5 h (control) and 2) WI for 3 h, with subjects seated nonimmersed for 1.5 h pre- and 1 h postimmersion. We measured left atrial diameter, heart rate, arterial pressure, urine volume and osmolality, and urinary endothelin, urodilatin, sodium, and potassium excretion. No significant difference existed between groups in cardiovascu-lar responses. The groups also exhibited mostly similar renal responses to immersion after adjustment for body mass. However, female urodilatin excretion per kilogram durin