The question of fat absorption from the stomach

Abstract

In 1889, Klemperer and Scheuerlen 1 found that no fat was absorbed from the stomach. They were able to recover 99.5 per cent. of the fat introduced into ligated stomachs of dogs after six hours. Within the last fifteen years, however, a number of investigators have published histological observations, from which they have concluded that gastric fat absorption does occur.

With the hope of obtaining some decisive evidence in relation to this question, two physiological-chemical methods, other than those previously employed, have been applied. Fat was introduced into the ligated stomachs of cats and dogs and a study of blood-fat content made in the one case, and in the second it was attempted to discover whether or not any fat left the lumen of the stomach by the use of fat stained with Sudan III. The animals were kept under anesthesia during the experiments.

In neither case could any fat be shown to leave the stomach, although histological studies of the gastric mucosa of the same animals gave results similar to those reported by Weiss, 2 Lamb, 3 Greene and Skaer 4 and others, showing that histologically demonstrable fat had entered the stomach walls.

Since no fat could be shown to have left the stomach by way of circulating fluids, it is concluded that no absorption occurs. The histological findings are explained by assuming that the fat present in the gastric cells entered by purely physico-chemical processes.