Hearts and blood vessels of mice receiving cortisone and estrogens

Abstract

AbstractMice received cortisone alone or concurrently with injections of estrone or diethylstilbestrol.Cortisone alone produced a high incidence of myocardial necrosis and abscesses in hearts, livers, lungs and kidneys. Staining and culture methods showed bacteria in these abscesses. The same technics failed to show infections in the mice receiving estrogen. Unrelated to other lesions the ventricular myocardium and walls of coronary arteries often contained accumulations of fat. Following concurrent injections of cortisone and an estrogen (estrone or diethylstilbestrol) the incidence of medial hyalinization of coronary arteries was 90%–98%. Edema, hemorrhage and hyalinization were observed in the aorta. In the cortisone plus estrogen groups such mural lesions of vessels developed in the absence of bacterial infection as studied by the above methods. The same was true when such infections were prevented by penicillin. The incidence of inflammatory lesions was less in mice receiving both cortisone and estrogen than in the cortisone (alone) group. Frequency of cortisone‐induced myocardial necrosis and accumulation of myocardial fat were not altered by the estrogens.