Concerning the elimination of dextrose into the gastrointestinal canal

Abstract

Our experiments have reference to statements in literature, some of which, for a better understanding of our results, may be here quoted very briefly. On the basis of analyses of the contents of the gastro-intestinal canal of seven rabbits, Fischer and Moore make the statement that “the small intestine of the rabbit contains no sugar, when an animal is killed shortly after having consumed several hundred grams of carrots and carrot tops or cabbage.” J. B. MacCallum reported that in a few experiments with intravenous injection of sodium chloride which, as is well known, produces glycosuria he found some dextrose in the stomach and intestines the quantity of which was slightly increased when, previous to the infusion of the sodium chloride, both kidneys were ligated. MacCallum thought that the presence of glucose in the intestines under these circumstances is due to the hyperglycemia and looked upon it as a sort of “intestinal diabetes”; he believed further that in the absence of the kidneys the intestines assume a supplementary excretory function. Fischer, on the other hand, draws the conclusions from some experiments that hyperglycemia alone does not lead to a secretion of glucose into the intestines. This occurs only, he maintains, when the infusion of sodium chloride is administered to hyperglycemic animals as was the case in Mac-Callum's experiments on account of the use of morphine.