This study shows that ranitidine has a significant adverse effect on the phosphate binding of calcium carbonate in patients with renal failure.

Contrary to previous reports, our patients maintained on CAPD for periods up to 25 months showed no improvement in their hematocrit. However, in comparison with a group of hemodialysis patients, our CAPD patients required transfusions, anabolic steroids and iron supplements less frequently. A small but not statistically significant increase in hematocrit was noted among patients transferred from hemodialysis to CAPD. Oxygen affinity, measured by P50, did not reveal the previously described elevation among hemodialysis patients. The reason(s) for this difference are only speculative at this time.

The role of the enterohepatic circulation in glutethimide (Doriden) metaboli~m and toxicity was investigated in patients and dogs undergoing biliary drailwge. Bile collected after the oral or parenteral administration of glutethimide contained imignificant quantities of active and tmmetabolized dTtlg. Oral administration of glutethimide both before and after complete biliary diversion revealed that this procedure mid no effect on the absorption, excretion, or clinical manifestations of the active form of the drug. It is concluded that the enterohepatic circulation does not have a significant effect on the handling of active unmetabolized glutethimide and that there is no indication for biliary drainage in glutethimide intoxication.

Thyroid function tests were performed in nine clinically euthyroid, chronic-renal-failure (CRF) patients on continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CAPD), and the results were compared with similar tests performed on normal controls and eight patients on maintenance hemodialysis (HD). As reported earlier in untreated patients with CRF and those maintained on HD, our patients on CAPD had markedly reduced total tri-iodothyronine (T3) concentration. Levels of serum thyroxine (T4), and serum free T4 estimated by the microencapsulated antibody technique were reduced in both groups of patients but were in the hypothyroid range only in the HD group. However, in keeping with the clinically euthyroid status of these patients, thyroid stimulating hormone levels were within normal limits. Finally, both groups of patients had low normal reverse T3 levels. These data confirm the presence of abnormalities in in vivo thyroid function tests in patients with CRF maintained by different modes of dialysis. The significance and mechanism of these abnormalities remains speculative.

No abstract