A COMPARISON OF THE METABOLIC EFFECTS OF SUBCUTANEOUS AND INTRAVENOUS EPINEPHRINE INJECTIONS IN NORMAL AND HYPOPHYSECTOMIZED RATS

Abstract

The effect of epinephrine on muscle glycogen, hex-osemonophosphate, blood sugar and intraven. glucose tolerance of anesthetized normal and hypophysectomized rats was detd. When the epinephrine was given subcut., all of these effects were less in the hypophysectomized than in the normal rats; when the epinephrine was given in a slow intraven. infusion, the effects in the hypophysectomized animals were equal to those in the normal ones. The differences in the reaction of the normal and hypophysectomized rats to the subcut. inj. of epinephrine are therefor attributed to a diminished rate of absorption of the epinephrine from the subcut. tissues in the absence of the hypophysis. The hypophysectomized rats showed a lower tolerance for intraven. administered glucose than did the normal ones, the reduction being of about the same order of magnitude as the decrease in metabolic rate. The hypophysectomized rats exhibited an abnormally high renal threshold for glucose, and whether epinephrine was given or not, excreted less glucose than did the normal rats.