154 The Influence of Intra- Venous Injection of Sugar. [June 7, 



There was a marked decrease of carbonic acid during the later 

 hours in those cases which suffered from coma. 



It would thus seem that in those cases when there are no nervous 

 symptoms caused by the intra-venous injection of sugar, while the 

 quantity of lactic acid is at its highest and the quantity of carbonic 

 acid in the blood is at its lowest, more carbonic acid is expired than 

 before the injection of the sugar. 



An explanation to this fact, if it really exists, is at the present 

 moment impossible. In order to settle this point it would be neces- 

 sary in the same animal to make all the analyses at the same time ; 

 which would be impossible without an exceptionally large dog, as 

 the quantity of blood needed would cause of itself changes in the 

 metabolism. 



In the next place the changes met with in the quantity of oxygen 

 in the blood are still more surprising, as there is no known reason 

 why haemoglobin should not take up the usual amount of oxygen as. 

 it does in health after the intra-venous injection of sugar. 



In all of the experiments the quantity of oxygen is seen to have 

 been markedly diminished during the first hour after the sugar in- 

 jection. 



In three of them it fell 0'464, 3'209, and 12-682 per cent, below the- 

 normal standard during the first hour. This result can be partially 

 explained by the influence of the endosmotic flow of the juices of the 

 tissues into the circulating blood, which is known to occur when the 

 quantity of sugar in the blood is increased. For in a series of similar 

 experiments Brasol* found that during the first five minutes after 

 the injection of sugar the proteids of the serum were reduced to even 

 below one half of their previous amount, while one or two hours 

 after the injection the proteids had, as a rule, returned to the normal 

 amount. 



During the third and fifth hours after the sugar injection it will be 

 noticed that the quantity of oxygen in the arterial blood was 14'886> 

 13'968, 14*569, and 17'767 per cent. ; that is to say the quantity that 

 is usually found in venous blood. 



The diminution in the quantity of oxygen, even from three to five- 

 hours after the sugar injection, cannot therefore be explained on a 

 dilution theory. 



* Brasol. Du Bois-Beymond's ' Archir.,' 1884. 



