A Salt-losing Syndrome in Infancy: Pseudo-Hypoadrenocorticalism

Abstract

In recent years three infants have been described in whom failure to thrive was associated with hypo- natraemia in the presence of apparently normal adrenocortical function. They were shown to have a saline diuresis which did not respond to adrenocortical hormones, and this led to the suggestion that the renal tubules in these patients were insen- sitive to the salt-retaining hormones (Cheek and Perry, 1958; Donnell, Litman and Roldan, 1959; Lelong, Alagille. Philippe, Gentil and Gabilan, 1960).