Relation of Capillary Resistance and Adrenal Corticosteroids. Stress-Induced Changes in the Sensitivity of Capillaries to Corticosteroids

¹ From the Department of Pediatrics, The Creighton University School of Medicine, Omaha, Nebraska

In view of the previous finding that changes in the degree of adrenocortical activity cannot always account for the stress-induced changes in the capillary resistance, two possibilities were investigated; a) the potential role of the growth hormone in balancing the corticosteroid effect, and b) the potential ability of the organism to change the sensitivity of the target organ capillaries to corticosteroids. The first part of this study, in which the plasma STH-content of stressed and unstressed rats had been measured, remained inconclusive. The second resulted in a method which seems to be suitable to demonstrate sensitivity changes in the capillaries to corticosteroids. By means of this method it was shown that various forms of stress increase capillary sensitivity to corticosteroids in the human as well as in the dog. The results point to a hitherto unknown capacity of the organism to deal with stressful situations in a way other than adrenocortical activation.