Although the intravenous injection of pituitary extracts into animals is usually followed by a considerable rise of blood pressure, no comparable effects have been observed after the injection of therapeutic doses of this drug into man. Thus, van den Velden1 says that he observed no constant and striking rise after injecting the usual doses, and Behrenroth,2 while noting a general skin pallor after intravenous injections, was unable to establish any definite and constant change in the blood pressure.
Since plethysmographic records of the arm made in this clinic showed that pituitary injections influenced the volume and form of the febrile pulse, it seemed worth while to restudy the effect of such injections in this class of patients in order to determine whether the changes observed in the pulse volume and form were accompanied by alterations in the systolic or diastolic blood pressures.
Twenty-seven observations were made on