368 Influence of Inanition on Metabolism. 



Unfortunately in the series of 2-day fasts, duplicate experiments were not made 

 with the same subject, and hence it is not possible to substantiate for the same 

 individual the wide variation between the amounts of nitrogen excreted on the 

 preliminary day and the first day of the fast. 



It is furthermore much to be regretted that the data are also lacking for this 

 comparison in the several fasts made by Succi. 



Prausnitz (5), in a critical discussion of the subject, reports two experiments 

 made with the same subjects in which the food on the day before the fast 

 contained a much larger amount of protein in one case than in the other. The 

 effect of the ingestion of increased amounts of protein on the nitrogen excretion 

 of the first fasting day is very evident. 



In fifteen 2-day fasting experiments on 12 different subjects, Prausnitz 

 observed a nitrogen excretion on the first day of the fast varying from 4.6 " 

 to 17.3 grams. 



Sadovyen (2) reports also a second experiment with "J" in which the 

 subject fasted 2 days without drinking water. The nitrogen excretion in the 

 urine was for the day before the fast, 20.842 grams; for the first day of fast, 

 12.6 grams; and for the second fasting day 11.55 grams. 



It is undoubtedly true that the nitrogen of protein ingested is not completely 

 eliminated for some 36 hours, yet it is nevertheless a fact that a large excretion 

 of nitrogen on the day preceding a fast may not necessarily be accompanied by 

 a similar excretion of nitrogen on the first fasting day. 



Although the nitrogenous excretion in the urine of the first fasting day 

 is influenced to a marked degree by the protein ingestion of the day prior to 

 the fast, the amounts of nitrogen eliminated on the second day of the experi- 

 ments (table 197), are much more nearly constant ranging from 9.95 grams 

 in experiment No. 80 to 14.46 grams in experiment No. 89. The average for 

 all the experiments is 12.76 grams. Comparison of experiments with the same 

 subject (S. A. B.) shows that the nitrogen excreted in experiment No. 77 on 

 the second day was 10.78 grams and in experiment No. 75, 12.45 grams. On 

 the second day of the other two experiments (Nos. 71 and 73) with S. A. B., 

 it was 11.04 and 11.97 grams, respectively. Thus, while marked variations in 

 the total quantity of nitrogen eliminated on the first day of the fast are 

 observed in experiments with different individuals and in experiments with the 

 same individual, on the second day of the fast the maximum difference in the 

 amount of nitrogen excreted by the same individual in four fasts was but 1.7 

 grams. 



Prausnitz (5) on the second day of fasting found in fifteen experiments with 

 twelve subjects a nitrogen excretion of 13.0, 4.4, 10.6, 13.0, 11.0, 10.3, 12.5, 

 14.9, 13.8, 14.5, 12.6, 16.0, 14.9, 13.0, and 19.3 grams, an average of 12.9 



"This unusually low nitrogen output, followed by a still lower amount (4.4 

 grams) on the second fasting day, has been the subject of special comment by 

 Prausnitz. 



