The antidiabetic functions of the pancreas and the successful isolation of the antidiabetic hormone - insulin / by J.J.R. Macleod and F.G. Banting.

  • Macleod, J. J. R. (John James Rickard), 1876-1935
Date:
1923 [©1924]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The antidiabetic functions of the pancreas and the successful isolation of the antidiabetic hormone - insulin / by J.J.R. Macleod and F.G. Banting. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    markable achievement, clue very largely to the work of Rubner, in Germany, of Benedict, in Boston, and of Graham Lusk, in New York, that it should now be pos¬ sible, by determining the respiratory quotient, to tell just exactly what proportion of carbohydrate, fat and protein a person is burning at a given time in his body. Now let us consider the behavior of the respiratory quotient in diabetes. In general terms this disease may be said to be a condition in which the body has lost the power to oxidize carbohydrate. In the severe forms of the disease the respiratory quotient is always about 0.7 and it does not increase however much carbohydrate may be given to the patient or the animal. In milder cases a moderate increase may occur, so that the quotient furnishes a useful test for the intensity of the diabetic condition. Now, it is extremely interesting that when in¬ sulin is given along with sugar to a diabetic animal, the quotient conies to behave immediately as it does in a normal animal; it immediately rises toward unity. Let me quote some experimental results in support of this statement. Before the pancreas was removed in a dog, thirty grams of cane sugar by mouth caused the quotient to rise nearly to 1 in thirty-five minutes. The animal was then depancreatised and in seventy-four hours after the pancreatectomy it was again given twenty grams of cane sugar with the effect that the respiratory quotient only rose from 0.7 to 0.77. There was a distinct but very slight effect. A little later it was given the same amount of cane sugar, plus insulin, with the result that the respiratory quotient rose in fifty minutes to 0.91, and in one hour and thirty-seven minutes to 0.93. This is an absolutely convincing result and one that has been obtained repeatedly, not only in diabetic dogs, but also in diabetic patients. There can be no doubt, then, but that insulin restores to the diabetic organism the lost