Effect of Adrenal Cortex Extract on the Course of Certain Human Infections

Abstract

Much experimental evidence indicates that the adrenals possess a detoxicating function. Lewis 1 showed that double adrenalectomy increased the sensitiveness of rats to cobra venom, adrenalin and diphtheria toxin. Scott 2 Remonstrated the greatly reduced resistance of adrenalectomized animals to doses of killed streptococci and staphylococci. Belding and Wyman 3 confirmed Lewis' work that adrenalectomy lowers the resistance of animals to diphtheria toxin. Recently several investigators have found increased resistance to bacterial intoxication is conferred by a cortical adrenal extract. 4 Scott and Bradford 5 found that the extract seemed to decrease slightly the susceptibility of adrenalectomized rats to killed typhoid bacilli. Hartman and Scott 6 later demonstrated that the resistance of adrenalectomized rats to bacterial intoxication was significantly increased by adrenal cortex extract.

These findings prompted us to use injections of cortical adrenal extract in patients with bacterial intoxication in the Colorado General Hospital. A preparation was made according to the technic of Swingle and Pfiffner and contained the equivalent of SO gm. gland per cc. Injections were usually given intramuscularly. The first case treated was a typical typhoid fever. The diagnosis was confirmed by blood culture, urine culture and Widal reaction. Two cc. of the extract were given on the eleventh day after the first prodromal symptoms. The temperature became normal on the second day following injection and remained so during the 14 days in the hospital.

The second case was one of undulant fever of 6 weeks' duration. Diagnosis was confirmed by blood culture and agglutination tests.

Two days following the injection of 2 cc. cortical extract the patient's temperature returned to normal and remained so for one week, when it showed an afternoon rise which promptly subsided following a second similar injection. The temperature remained practically normal during the rest of his stay in the hospital (9 days), only rising on 2 occasions to 99.2°F.