Determination, Recovery, Identification and Renal Clearance of Conjugated Adrenal Corticoids in Human Peripheral Blood.

Abstract

Following ethanol precipitation of human plasma the free corticoids were extracted with methylene chloride as were the conjugated corticoids after hydrolysis with 300-500 units per ml of beta-glucu-ronidase. Recoveries of tetrahydro-E monoglucuronide added to plasma were quantitatively recovered by this method. Acid hydrolysis was unsatisfactory. After giving large doses of free tetrahydro-E orally to a human subject, this steroid was recovered from plasma both in the free and conjugated fractions, the latter case in amounts exceeding 30 mg/100 ml of plasma. Clearance studies demonstrated that the free steroid was excreted in the urine at an average rate of 11.2% and the conjugated 71.0% as compared with creatinine.