THE EFFECT OF HYPOPHYSECTOMY AND OF PHYONE INJECTIONS ON THE PANCREAS AND LIVER OF THE NEWT

Abstract

Observations on the histology of the pancreatic islands of animals in hyperpituitary or hypopituitary states are rare in contrast to the abundance of physiological data. Anselmino and his co-workers (1, 2, 3) have described an increase in number and size and a new formation of islands in rats after 6 to 7 injections of an anterior lobe extract. Aron (4) has induced a premature appearance of islands in foetal guinea pigs injected in utero with an anterior lobe preparation. Kojima (5) discovered an accumulation of granules in the island cells of rats after posterior lobe feeding but none after anterior lobe feeding. Reports of negative or doubtful findings predominate, such as those of Putnam et al (6) and Evans et al (7) who found pancreases much larger than normal but no increase or histological differences in islet tissue of dogs made acromegalic by long-continued injections of anterior lobe extracts. Lucke (8) also observed no histological changes in islands of rats whose carbohydrate metabolism had been modified by injections of anterior pituitary extracts. In protocols of supposed pituitary basophilism (9) there is recorded in one case a “questionable enlargement of the pancreatic islets,” in another “an unusual number of islets,” and in another “the pancreatic islets were relatively few and atrophic in the part of the gland that had escaped necrosis.” Though generalized splanchnomegaly occurs in acromegaly, histological data on the islands are scarce and their functional derangement alone is apt to be reported.