Oxygen consumption in pyloric stenosis is low, and does not change after rehydration. After operation and realimentation, oxygen consumption increases to normal before wasting of the body is corrected, and the weight curve begins to rise. Thus, low oxygen consumption is clearly connected with starvation. Oxygen consumption in the common nonedematous type of infantile malnutrition, with a flat weight curve and normal caloric intake, was found to be high as reported by other authors. Oxygen consumption is invariably low in the severest type of progressive infantile malnutrition complicated by starvation ("athrepsia"). The oxygen consumption of the malnourished infant is ultimately determined by two factors: 1) change in body structure and composition; and 2) starvation. With increasing disappearance of fat tissue, oxygen consumption per kilogram of body weight tends to rise. Low values are due to concomitant starvation, as in untreated pyloric stenosis, "athrepsia" and probably in kwashiorkor. In similar studies of adults, malnutrition was usually associated with, and also brought about by, semistarvation; that is the reason oxygen consumption was always reported to be low. The cause of apparent difference in oxygen consumption between the "adult" and "infantile" types of malnutrition may be in the absence of actual starvation in many of the latter.
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F Varga (1959) studied this question.