A steroid metabolic study on adrenalectomized patients after administration of compounds E and F and Reichstein's substance S.

Abstract

When steroid metabolic investigations are performed on patients with intact adrenals, the question always arises, how do administered steroids affect the secretion of the adrenals themselves? Hence, patients who have undergone total adrenalectomy are suitable subjects for the study of this problem. Despite the report of Laidlaw et al. (1952) that continued steroid excretion takes place after adrenalectomy, there is reason to believe that in adrenalectomized women and orchidectomized, adrenalectomized men without substitution therapy, the steroid excretion is of an order that cannot fundamentally affect the results in steroid metabolic studies. In some cases we have been able to demonstrate that as early as 48 hours after discontinuation of substitution therapy the 17-ketosteroid excretion is very small in these patients (Birke & Plantin, 1953). When it was reported by Cohen (1951) that the corticoids of the urine are conjugated to glucuronic acid and that a substantially greater yield is obtained