An attempt was made to administer diuretine hypodermically to the cat in a dose of 0.35 to 0.5 grm. per kilo of body weight. Since the poisoning lost or greatly diminished the appetite, in some cases food was not given for some days after the injection and in some others a standard fluid food, composed of milk, Liebig's extract, soluble starch, glucose and water was given. The blood sugar before and after the diuretine administration and before and after giving the food was regularly investigated.
(1) On injecting diuretine the blood sugar content of the cat, espccially when the food was given not long before the injection, was found to increase but for only some hours, say three to five hours, the peak being reached probably within one hour after the injection, the initial content was recovered once, but the sugar level begun to increase again, and reached the acme, as a rule on the second or third day of the poisoning and the hyperglycaemia continued as the whole three to six days or longer. This long lasting, moderate hypergly caemia took place regardless of whether food was given or not after the diuretine administration.
(2) The standard fluid food, above given, invariably occasioned alimentary hyperglycaemia, and when it was given during the diuretine poisoning, the alimentary hyperglycaemia appeared apparently exaggerated. But the magnitude of the hyperglycaemia seems to be regarded merely as the sum of the long lasting diuretine hyperglycaemia and the alimentary hyperglycaemia. The magnitude of the alimentary hyperglycaemia during the poisoning was greatest on the second or third day of the poisoning, occasionally on the fourth day, and the exaggeration lasted for four to six days at least.
(3) The transitory hyperglycaemia which makes its appearance immediately after the diuretine injection and lasts for some hours only, disappeared when the splanchnic nerves and the semilunar ganglia were bilaterally interfered with. Otherwise expressed, it is of the central mechanism. Injection of the drug under the skin evokes an enormous excitement on the site of the animal, which lasts about a half hour and is followed by the depressive stage.
The moderate hyperglycaemia lasting for several days after the diuretine injection, the alimentary hyperglycaemia due to administration of the above mentioned fluid food, and its exaggeration during the diuretine poisoning were capable of developing in the cat so operated on. Therefore two forms of hyperglycaemia are to be distinguished, that is, the transitory hyperglycaemia of the central mechanism, which immediately follows the diuretine administration, and the long lasting hyperglycaemia with a long latency which is not of the central mechanism.
(4) Glycosuria was seldom detected in the fasting cat poisoned with diuretine, but it was invariably observed when the alimentary hyperglycaemia was induced in the cat under diuretine.
Salicylic acid was determined in the urine. Ten to twenty hours after the diuretine injection the amount detectable reached the maximum. For 5 to 10 days the reaction was positive.
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