CLINICAL EVALUATION OF COMBINED PROLAN AND ANTERIOR PITUITARY THERAPY*

Abstract

Intensive experimental and clinical observations during the past decade have definitely established that sex function and body growth depend totally upon stimuli from the anterior lobe of the hypophysis, and that the latter, to a degree, also stimulates the adrenals, thyroid and possibly other glands of internal secretion. In the absence of adequate quantities of the gonad-stimulating hormone in pituitary extracts for therapeutic use, the discovery in 1928 by Aschheim and Zondek (1) of a substance in the urine of pregnant women capable of evoking an ovarian response in the rodent qualitatively identical with that of implants and extracts of anterior lobe tissue met Avith the fondest hope that a therapeutic agent for functional menstrual disorders was at last available in sufficient quantity to meet the needs of the medical profession. Disappointment followed the realization that only 10 per cent of amenorrheic women respond to treatment with the product when it is employed as the sole agent. Functional ut...