PubMed Health⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

L Higginbotham

Publications and source records attributed to L Higginbotham.

4 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1980

D-propranolol and DL-propranolol both decrease conversion of L-thyroxine to L-triiodothyronine.

The effects of propranolol (DL-propranolol) and D-propranolol on thyroid hormone metabolism were studied in six euthyroid volunteers receiving L-thyroxine (T4) and six hypothyroid patients receiving T4 replacement. D-propranolol as well as propranolol decreased L-triiodothyronine (T3) concentrations and the ratio of T3 to T4 in the euthyroid subjects, and D-propranolol decreased these variables in the subjects with hypothyroidism (propranolol was not given to this group). It is concluded from this study and from parallel invitro investigations that the effect of propranolol on the conversion of T4 to T3 is unrelated to its beta-adrenergic blocking activity, and that at low therapeutic doses propranolol may exert appreciable "membrane-stabilising" effects in vivo.

Aged↗
PubMed1980

Diabetes mellitus in urban and rural communities in Papua New Guinea. Studies of prevalence and plasma insulin.

Oral glucose tolerance tests (75 g) in 185 urban residents of Port Moresby and 105 ethnically similar rural villagers showed that 15.8% of urban residents had diabetes mellitus (two hour plasma glucose > 11.0 mmol/l and a total of 22% were glucose intolerant (plasma glucose > 9.0 mmol/l), compared with 1.0% and 5.5% in rural people. - Urban men and women were significantly fatter than rural people, but within each population glucose tolerance was not significantly related to weight or to age, although the numbers of old people studied were small. Compared to Australians the Papua New Guinea subjects had a higher fasting plasma insulin (16.5 vs 10.7 microU/ml, p = < 0.05); independent of weight fasting plasma insulin was significantly higher in the rural than urban people studied. After the glucose load, plasma insulin and glucose levels were positively correlated in rural people. In contrast, for the urban group the relation best fitted a quadratic function, with decline in plasma insulin at high levels of glucose. - The prevalence of diabetes in urbanised Melanesians in Papua New Guinea appears similar to other South Pacific countries.

Adolescent↗