INTERNAL SECRETION 



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opposite opening in the skull, the opposite half of the cerebrum is displaced 

 and protruded so that injury to the brain from compression is prevented. 

 The gland can then be picked up with forceps and removed. Paulesco 

 reported that the total removal of the gland in 24 dogs resulted in death in 

 24 hours. In seven other animals the fatal result was postponed for variable 

 periods. One animal survived for five months and another for a year 

 without exhibiting any very characteristic symptoms. As a post-mortem 

 examination showed that the gland was only partially removed it was 

 assumed that the remaining portion had been sufficient to maintain life. 

 Removal of the anterior lobe alone was followed by death as certainly as when 

 the entire gland was removed. Removal of the posterior lobe alone was not 

 followed by noticeable effects. From these facts Paulesco asserted that the 

 hypophysis is an organ indispensable to life as its removal rapidly eventuates in 

 death, and that of its different parts the anterior lobe is the more important. 

 Crowe, Gushing and Homans have more recently reported a series of 100 

 operations for the removal of the hypophysis, the results of which are corrobo- 

 rative in many respects of the results of Paulesco. It was found that the 

 duration of life in adult dogs was from two to three days and in young dogs 

 about eleven days. In a few cases the animals survived for several weeks 

 but a post-mortem examination showed that small viable portions of the 

 gland had escaped removal. Among the many symptoms that followed to- 

 tal hypophysectomy according to these experimenters the more striking after 

 24 hours were a lowering of body- temperature, unsteadiness of gait and stiff- 

 ness of movement, a fall of blood-pressure, feeble and slow respiration, 

 muscle twitchings, lethargy, coma, and death. In old animals there was 

 occasional glycosuria; in young animals polyuria. Total removal of the 

 anterior lobe alone in this series of experiments was also as fatal as removal 

 of the entire gland. 



The Effects of Partial Removal of the Anterior Lobe. When only a 

 portion of the anterior lobe was removed the animal survived for a much 

 longer period than when the removal was complete. The duration of life 

 apparently depended on the amount and the cellular activity of the parts left 

 behind. As a result of the partial removal only there developed a series of 

 phenomena to which the term cachexia hypophyseopriva has been given. 

 These phenomena varied somewhat in accordance with the age of the 

 animal. Adult animals became adipose and degenerated sexually, young 

 animals likewise became adipose but they remained undersized and failed 

 to develop sexual characteristics and hence sexual infantilism persisted. 

 The organs of reproduction in both sexes remained rudimentary. The 

 temperature was subnormal and nutritive disorders of the skin developed. 

 These various symptoms were attributed at the time to the partial removal 

 of the anterior lobe alone and hence a deficiency of secretion, but the results 

 of a series of experiments, subsequently published by Gushing, led to the 

 belief that some of these phenomena were due to injury or impairment of the 

 normal function of the posterior lobe at, or subsequent to, the time of the 

 operation. Just which of these phenomena were to be attributed to a 

 diminished secretion of the anterior lobe and which to a diminished secretion 

 of the posterior lobe was left for future experiments to determine. However 

 important the function of the anteror lobe may be in relation to the phe- 

 nomena just mentioned, it is apparent that it must have some additional func- 



