Abstract
Urinary excretion of formiminoglutamic acid (FIGLU) and urocanic acid after a loading with 15g of L-histidine was observed in 53 patients with various liver diseases. Of 53 patients 58.5% was in excess of FIGLU, 52.0% for urocanic acid, and 64.0% for the two combined derivatives. The frequent abnormality in these histidine derivatives in liver diseases suggested a widespread deficiency in folic acid metabolism in such patients.
For analyzing the mechanism of an excessive excretion of histidine derivatives, the therapeutic trials with minimal daily doses of folic acid, tetrahycro-folic acid (THF), and doses of coenzyme B12 and CN-B12 were carried out in seven patients with liver diseases and changes in the urinary histidine derivatives were observed.
Four out of seven patients responded to folic acid, and oneof two patients refractory to folic acid responded to THF.
It was of particular interest that a case in which both folic acid and THF were ineffective, responded to both coenzyme B12 and vitamin B12. The mechanism of an increased excretion of histidine derivatives in the liver disease was discussed.
