Edema Production* 



497 



Abstracts of Communications 

 Thirty-seventh meeting. 



California Branch. Berkeley, California, April 24, 1923. 



243 (2203) 



The mechanism of edema production by paraphenylenediamin. 



By M. L. T A INTER and P. J. HANZLIK. 



[From the Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, 

 Stanford University, San Francisco.] 



The subcutaneous injection of paraphenylenediamin hydro- 

 chlorid in the dosage of 0.19 gm. per kilo in rabbits, produces a 

 peculiar, specific edema of the head and neck in from one to 

 three (median, one and one-half) hours after the administra- 

 tion. At the same time there is a relative increase in hemoglobin 

 and total solids of the blood due to escape of fluid from the cir- 

 culation, indicating that increase in vascular permeability may 

 be a factor in the production of the edema. With this dosage, 

 and providing the freshly dissolved drug is injected, edema is 

 produced almost invariably. Old and standing solutions (even 

 for 24 hours') are uncertain and ineffective, and this, in part at 

 least, explains the variabilities previously encountered. The fol- 

 lowing is a summary of results on 96 animals which have been 

 used for the study, in various ways, to date. 



Meissner claimed that large doses of atropin and calcium pre- 

 vented the edema. We have not been able to confirm this. Max- 

 imal doses of the following agents injected in various ways did 

 not influence the development and the course of the edema nor 

 the blood concentration; calcium, atropin, morphin, chloral hy- 

 drate, urethan. ether, sodium bromide, cocain, ergotoxin, anti- 

 pyrin, neocinchophen. sodium salicylate, quinin and cinchophen 

 (in some rabbits). In about half of the rabbits receiving 

 cinchophen, the production of pleural and peritoneal exudates 

 was favored and the mortality increased. Our results with 

 atropin and calcium agree with negative results of Gibbs who 

 used cats instead of rabbits for studying the edema of para- 

 phenylenediamin. The only agent which has prevented the edema 

 thus far is nicotin in large doses hypodermically. Section and 



