THE ANTIDIURETIC EFFECT OF PITUITARY EXTRACT APPLIED INTRANASALLY IN A CASE OF DIABETES INSIPIDUS

INTRODUCTION  The combination in diabetes insipidus of insatiable thirst and polyuria interfering with sleep and all the ordinary activities of life naturally has stimulated numerous workers in the past ten years to devise some method whereby the lives of the sufferers of this disease could be made more tolerable. In 1913, Von der Velden¹ and Farini² demonstrated that the subcutaneous injection of pituitary extract checked both the polyuria and the polydipsia. This observation has been abundantly confirmed. Two features of hypophyseal therapy render it still highly unsatisfactory. First, the effect is transitory, and, second, hypodermic injection has always been essential and is inconvenient and difficult for continued use of patients.Even though the effect is transitory, however, if pituitary extract could be introduced into the body in more frequent doses and in a less inconvenient manner, great comfort would naturally result. Absorption by way of the gastro-intestinal tract has been