Pituitaries v. This-&-That

In almost the exact centre of the human head, hanging from the base of the brain by a hollow stem, is the pituitary gland. Normally about the size of a large pea, in giants it may be as big as a hen's egg. It has two lobes, anterior & posterior. Like other endocrine glands it secretes hormones (exciters) into the blood. Doctors know less than they would like to know about the pituitary gland. They know it is intimately related to growth and sexual maturity; they believe its hormones regulate the functioning of all the other endocrines. Last week came news of the glands' potency against various ailments.

v. Poliomyelitis. Three years ago Dr. Earl Theron Engle left Stanford University; California, moved to Columbia in

New York. He wanted to study hormones, especially those of the pituitary gland. With him went his friend Dr. Claus W. Jungeblut. Dr. Jungeblut was interested in infantile paralysis. Both experimented with monkeys. When they took their subjects off to their separate laboratories many a monkey friendship was broken up. Not so with the doctors; outside their laboratories they discussed their respective work. In one of their discussions they reasoned thus: Dr. Engle was studying pituitary hormones, which can stimulate early sex maturity. Dr. Jungeblut was studying infantile paralysis, which usually occurs before sex maturity. Might there be some connection between pituitary hormones and infantile paralysis? Why not combine their studies? The monkeys at least would thank them. Jeremiah Milbank's International Committee for the Study of Infantile Paralysis furnished the money, the researchers researched jointly.

They took anterior pituitary hormones from sheep and rats and gave them to monkeys a year and a half old, the age which compares with the most susceptible period in children. Then they injected infantile paralysis virus into the monkeys. Some of the monkeys had passing attacks of paralysis, others did not catch it at all. But all of them grew up suddenly, acquired the sex maturity of three-year-old monkeys. Those not treated with pituitary hormones usually developed paralysis from the virus, died. Drs. Jungeblut & Engle concluded that pituitary hormones, not immunity through exposure (the general theory), enable most adults to resist infantile paralysis.

They submitted a cautious report to the pediatrics section of the New York Academy of Medicine. They warned that their work was still in its preliminary stage, was far from having produced a preventive for poliomyelitis. Chief obstacle to overcome: the hastening of maturity by the hormone extract. This they thought could be done by carefully regulating the dosage.

v. Cancer. The pituitary gland's power to balance body growth suggested to Dr. William Susman of the University of Manchester that its extract might be useful against cancer. Dr. Susman, pathologist, had noticed during the autopsies of some 200 cancer victims that their pituitaries and pancreases were generally and suspiciously abnormal. The ill-conditioned pancreases suggested that the patient had been eating a great amount of carbohydrates, like sugar and bread. Dr. Susman verified this suspicion by irritating the skin of mice until cancers developed. Bread-fed mice showed cancers much more frequently than oat-&-cheese fed mice.

Dr. Susman had bins full of cancerous mice. To a portion of them he gave pituitary extracts. A sufficient number of mice thus treated recovered from their cancers to warrant Dr. Susman's practicing on a couple of human cases of skin cancer. Their improvement was great, "life appeared to be definitely prolonged."

The Manchester work engendered a warning. It applies only to skin cancer. Even in skin cancer pituitary extract cannot yet be considered a cure, or even a clear-cut method of treatment.

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