PITUITARY NECROSIS AND DIABETES MELLITUS

Abstract

THIS article deals with a case of diabetes mellitus and hypertension associated with pituitary necrosis and hypopituitarism. Experimentally, it has been established that the anterior pituitary and adrenal hotmones have an important influence on carbohydrate metabolism. It is rare for the clinician to have an opportunity to study some of the laboratory phenomena occurring as a result of diseases of these glands. The effects of the overfunctioning pituitary and adrenal glands on carbohydrate metabolism have been studied in patients with acromegaly and with Cushing's syndrome, in whom diabetes mellitus is commonly found as a sequela. There are also reports of the diabetes resulting from these diseases being corrected by treating the overfunctioning gland. In a patient with basophilic adenoma, Cushing (1) was able to effect the disappearance of the diabetes by x-ray therapy to the skull. Almy and Shorr (2) studied the disappearance of established diabetes in an acromegalic, following basilar meningitis. Sprague et al. (3) reported a case in which the diabetes disappeared after the removal of an adrenal cortical tumor.