Further observations on the estimation of urinary gonadotropins in non-pregnant human subjects.

Abstract

One of the great difficulties in estimating the excretion of gonadotropins in non-pregnant subjects is the fact that no International Standard preparation is available for comparative assay of these substances. Accordingly it has been necessary to express results of clinical assays in terms of arbitrary “animal” units, a unit being defined as that quantity necessary to produce a given effect. Arbitrary units employed in intact and hypophysectomized rats have included the doses necessary to induce vaginal cornification, to cause histologic changes in the ovaries, and and to induce a 50–100 per cent increase in the weight of ovaries, uterus, seminal vesicles and the ventral lobe of the prostate (1–4). In intact immature mice most investigators have adopted as a unit the quantity of extract causing a 100–200 per cent increase in uterine weight (5–8). It is now generally recognized that the error of results expressed without reference to a standard preparation may be threefold or more, and that little quantitative significance can be attached to data calculated in this way.