2 28 INANITION AND MALNUTRITION 



A peculiar exception was found by Kusmin ('96) in rabbits and dogs, the 

 heart during starvation with hyperthermia (with or without water) appearing 

 even increased in weight, which was interpreted as a functional hypertrophy. 

 This may perhaps explain other exceptions occasionally found. Thus Weiske 

 ('97) in 3 rabbits on water only, with body loss of 35 to 41 per cent, found an 

 apparent decrease of about 29 per cent in heart weight in two, while in the third 

 there was an apparent increase of 10 per cent. 



Sedlmaier ('99) concluded that in starved rabbits the heart loses relatively 

 somewhat less than the whole body; while Beeli ('08) observed an apparent loss 

 of 72 per cent in heart weight, with loss of only 51 per cent in body weight. 

 With losses of 34 and 36 per cent in the body weight of guinea pig and rabbit, 

 Heitz ('12) noted corresponding apparent losses of 20 and 24 per cent in the heart 

 weight. 



Jackson ('15) found in albino rats with acute inanition an average loss of 

 28 per cent in heart weight (and of 33 per cent in body weight), and with 

 chronic inanition a loss of t,t, per cent in heart weight (and of 36 per cent in body 

 weight.) (Table 4.) In fasting pigeons with loss of about 40 per cent in body 

 weight, McCarrison ('21) noted a comparable loss in heart weight (Fig. 35). 

 In fasting frogs with body losses varying from 10 to 60 per cent, Ott ('24) 

 found nearly corresponding losses in heart weight in the males, but usually 

 somewhat less in the females (Table 6). 



In young animals during inanition, the heart usually appears somewhat more 

 resistant. Bechterew ('95) found that in newborn kittens and puppies the loss 

 in heart weight is relatively less than in body weight. In young albino rats 

 held at constant body weight by underfeeding from 3 to 10 weeks of age, Jackson 

 ('15a) found practically no decrease in heart weight; and in those underfed from 

 birth, Stewart ('18, '18a, '19) found even an apparent increase in heart weight, 

 up to 25 per cent. In the atrophic offspring of underfed pregnant mother rats, 

 Barry ('20, '21) observed an average cardiac weight 8 per cent above normal 

 (Table 4). 



In underfed rats, after maintenance from age of 3 to 12 weeks, Stewart 

 ('16) found the heart 16 to 34 per cent underweight, with apparent overcompen- 

 satory recovery (+17 per cent) after amply refeeding 4 weeks, but normal rela- 

 tions after refeeding 16 weeks. Jackson and Stewart ('19) noted nearly normal 

 heart weight in rats amply refed to 25-75 g-> after underfeeding from birth to 3 

 or 6 weeks (Table 7). The heart appeared slightly above normal in weight in 

 young rats refed by Jackson and Stewart (,'20) to adult stages after various 

 periods of severe early underfeeding (Table 8). 



Trowbridge, Moulton and Haigh ('18, '19) and Moulton, Trowbridge and 

 Haigh ('22a) found the heart weight approximately normal for body weight in 

 young steers of various ages, irrespective of the plane of nutrition. 



Effects on Cardiac Structure. — The effects of total inanition (or on water 

 only) upon cardiac structure will be considered first in man and later among 

 infrahuman species. In human adults, the earlier observations (such as Dono- 

 van '48 and Muller '83) on the structural changes during inanition included 

 merely the gross features, including disappearance of the pericardial fat, and 



