Abstract
Plasma protein deficiency results in a decrease of the osmotic pressure of the blood and has been held to be part of the explanation of edema in nephrosis and certain cases of undernutrition. If this postulation be correct the capillary pressure would be in excess of the osmotic pressure of the blood and as a result of the increased transudation a state of oligemia should be expected to prevail under such conditions. That this is actually the case in nephrosis has been shown by Darrow 1 and Waterfield. 2 The behavior of blood volume in nutritional edema has, however, not received the attention it deserves. The present report deals with the blood volume changes in both of these diseases, special attention being directed towards correlating such volume changes with the fluctuation of the plasma protein.
The plasma protein was determined by the micro-kjeldahl method and the blood volume by inhalation of carbon monoxide according to the technic reported previously. 3 Hematocrit readings were made by the method of Osgood. 4 In the cases of nephrosis the 24-hour urine output for the day of examination was also ascertained. In all, 5 cases of nephrotic kidney condition and 7 cases of nutritional edema were studied. The findings are given in Tables I and II.
On examining the data two points deserve special emphasis. First, in both diseases, when not complicated by severe anemia, the blood volume expressed in cc. per square meter of the surface area (calculated from patient's height and wight) was very much lower than the normal standard determined by the same method. 3 This is in agreement with the previous work on nephrosis 1 , 2 and further corroborates the belief that the edema of these 2 diseases may be placed under the same category.
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