Some Further Observations on Steroid Diabetes in the Rat

The production of a diabetic state by the administration of cortisone to normal force-fed rats was first reported by Ingle (1941). The term »steroid diabetes« was introduced (Ingle et al., 1945) in reference to the hyperglycemia and glycosuria caused by the administration of large doses of adrenal cortical steroids to normal animals. Steroid diabetes caused by the administration of an excess of adrenal cortical steroids does not differ from the diabetic state caused by the administration of an excess of corticotropin (Ingle, Li & Evans, 1946); indeed, the term is now being more widely used to refer to the diabetic state associated with experimental and clinical hypercorticalism (Sprague, 1953). The data of this report illustrate the production of steroid diabetes under easily reproducible conditions and show different patterns of response in individual animals. Male rats of the Sprague-Dawley strain having initial weights of approximately 300 gm. were