20 



HAROLD L. HIGGINS 



of the hearts of animals after prolonged fasting show almost complete 

 disappearance of fat (Heitz, 1912). 



The pulse rate falls gradually both in undernutrition and in fasting. 

 The figures in Table 11 give the average pulse rate of Levanzin awake in 

 the morning before getting up. This fall in pulse rate is associated with 

 a fall in metabolism. 



TABLE 11 

 AVERAGE PULSE RATE IN FASTING MAN 



(Data for table from Benedict.) 



A similar fall in the pulse rate of men before and after three weeks 

 on a low caloric diet occurs as the figures given in Table 12 show. 



TABLE 12 

 PULSE RATE IN UNDERFEEDING 



Normal Diet 



Reduced Diet 



(Data for table from Benedict, Miles, Roth and Smith.) 



The blood pressure falls both in undernutrition and fasting. With 

 Levanzin, from a figure of about one hundred and twenty millimeters Hg 

 systolic, ninety millimeters diastolic, before the fast, it fell to about one 

 hundred millimeters Hg systolic, eighty millimeters diastolic, toward the 

 latter part of the fast, rising soon after the fast to the previous figure. 

 The pulse pressure also fell from thirty millimeters Hg to twenty milli- 

 meters. The above picture is frequently seen clinically, when a low 

 caloric feeding regime is tried in patients with arterial hypertension. 



