16 ENDOCRINE GLANDS 



adrenals and finally, there are some whose secretions are 

 still not well understood, such as, the pituitary, the para- 

 thyroid, etc. Gradually our knowledge of all these glands 

 has become broader and at the present time it is possible 

 to give a fairly accurate description of their pathology 

 and to give some general principle as to treatment. 



FUNCTIONAL DISTURBANCES. 



Insufficiency. Hyperf unction. Aberration of Function. Functional 

 Glandular Correlation. Part Played by the Sympathetic. 



The destructive lesions being the easiest ones to inter- 

 pret and the resulting conditions the easiest to appreciate 

 and reproduce experimentally by the removal of the organ, 

 it was the functional insufficiency of an organ which was 

 first noticed. Insufficiency of the thyroid was spoken of 

 when myxedema followed the removal of the thyroid, in- 

 sufficiency of the adrenals when the destruction of the 

 adrenals was noticed in Addison's disease. Inversely it was 

 noticed that in some cases there seemed to be exaggeration 

 of function and that the symptoms noticed were the 

 inverse of those observed in insufficiency. These cases 

 were spoken of as hyperf unction ; hyperf unction of the 

 thyroid was opposed to hypothyroidism of myxedema, 

 hyperfunction of the adrenals was suspected as a cause 

 of hypertension, and inversely hypotension was suspected 

 to be due to hypoadrenalism. Gradually it was found out, 

 after many physiological and anatomical observations, 

 that functional disturbances are not always as simple and 

 aberration of function had to be added to the others. 



From a descriptive point of view it is very useful to 

 make such a division. As soon as an endocrine gland is 

 disturbed its function is altered, either there is an excess, 

 a decrease or an aberration of the secretion; that is, in 

 the case of the thyroid, hyperthyroidism, hypothyroidism, 



