THE EFFECT OF INANITION ON THE INACTIVATION OF ESTROGEN BY THE LIVER1

Abstract

It has been established that exogenous estrogens can be inactivated by the animal organism with great facility. Zondek and Sklow (1941) have shown that only 5 per cent of the estrogen administered to rats can be recovered from the animal body three hours after its subcutaneous injection. Heller (1940); Singher et al. (1944) have demonstrated by in vitro studies that the liver is the organ involved in this degradation mechanism. Talbot (1939), Schiller and Pincus (1944) and others have shown an impairment of inactivation in the presence of hepatic parenchymal damage in the rat and Glass, Edmondson and Soil (1940) have demonstrated the same phenomenon in patients with advanced hepatic cirrhosis. Golden and Sevringhaus (1938) implanted ovaries into a site drained by the portal vein and discovered that the rats showed no sign of estrus as determined by vaginal smear. However, if these ovaries were re-implanted into the axilla, estrus re-appeared.