EFFECT OF CORTICOTROPHIN AND CORTISONE ON THE BLOOD IN VARIOUS DISORDERS IN MAN

Abstract

SINCE the discovery that corticotrophin (ACTH) and cortisone exert beneficial effects on a wide variety of disease processes which had not been considered previously to be primarily hormonal in nature, a number of patients with disorders of the blood have been treated with these agents. This report describes our own studies in 40 cases. A preliminary report of the observations on 24 of these cases has been published.¹ It is now well known that lymphopenia and neutrophilia develop in experimental animals² and in man³ after administration of corticotrophin. The reduction in circulating eosinophils which follows administration of corticotrophin has been used as a test for adrenal-cortical insufficiency.⁴ Alterations have also been produced by corticotrophin and cortisone in various disease processes involving the leucocytes. Thus, improvement after corticotrophin therapy has been seen in a number of cases of acute leukemia, with "complete" temporary remissions in some. Improvement