Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T13:24:53.907Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Glutamic Acid and its Salts in Petit Mal Epilepsy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 February 2018

D. A. Pond
Affiliation:
Departments of Clinical Neurophysiology and Biochemistry, The Institute of Psychiatry, Maudsley Hospital, London
M. H. Pond
Affiliation:
Departments of Clinical Neurophysiology and Biochemistry, The Institute of Psychiatry, Maudsley Hospital, London

Extract

The following experiments on glutamic acid were carried out in view of the conflicting reports of Price, Waelsch and Putnam (1943), Waelsch and Price (1944), and Goodman et al. (1948) on its effect in epilepsy. A number of preliminary experiments were made which suggested that there was an apparent difference between the effects of glutamic acid and sodium glutamate. Such a difference does not appear to have been considered by most other investigators. It was decided therefore to try to determine whether a possible reason for the difference was the effect of the sodium ion on water balance, since this is known to be related to the tendency to seizures (McQuarrie et al., 1932, Swinyard et al., 1946, and Weinland, 1949). For comparison potassium glutamate was given in a way to be described below. The experiments will be reported under the following headings:

  1. 1. The acute E.E.G. and clinical effects of intravenous sodium glutamate.

  2. 2. The short term (one week) E.E.G. and clinical effects of glutamic acid, its sodium and potassium salts and a placebo.

  3. 3. Longer term clinical effects in out-patients.

  4. 4. Biochemical studies of the blood and urine levels of glutamic acid by paper chromatography of 7 epileptic patients and 5 non-epileptic control subjects, including salt and water balance studies of patients and controls.

Type
Part I.—Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1951 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ambrose, A. M., Power, F. W., and Sherwin, C. P., J. Biol. Chem., 1933, 101, 669675.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Awapara, J., and Marvin, H. N., ibid., 1949, 178, 691693.Google Scholar
Cohen, P. P., ibid., 1940, 136, 565584.Google Scholar
Consden, R., Gordon, A. H., and Martin, A. J. P., Biochem. J., 1944, 38, 224232.Google Scholar
Iidem, ibid., 1947, 41, 590596.Google Scholar
Dent, C. E., ibid., 1948, 43, 169180.Google Scholar
Goodman, L. S., Swinyard, E. A., and Toman, J. E. P., Arch. Neur. Psych., 1946, 56, 2029.Google Scholar
Klein, J. R., and Olsen, N. S., J. Biol. Chem., 1947, 167, 15.Google Scholar
Krebs, H. A., and Eggleston, L. V., Biochem. J., 1949, 44, vii.Google Scholar
Iidem and Hems, R., ibid., 1949, 44, 159163.Google Scholar
Mayer-Gross, W., and Walker, J. W., ibid., 1949, 44, 9297.Google Scholar
McQuarrie, I., Husted, C., and Manchester, R. C., Am. J. Dis. Child., 1932, 43, 15191543.Google Scholar
Pond, M. H., J. ment. Sci., 1950, 96, 10481054.Google Scholar
Prescott, B. A., and Waelsch, H., J. Biol. Chem., 1947, 167, 855860.Google Scholar
Price, J. C., Waelsch, H., and Putnam, T. J., J.A.M.A., 1943, 122, 11531156.Google Scholar
Swinyard, E. A., Toman, J. E. P., and Goodman, L. S., J. Neurophysiol., 1946, 9, 4754.Google Scholar
Waelsch, H., and Price, J. C., Arch. Neur. Psychiat., 1944, 51, 393396.Google Scholar
Idem, Am. J. Ment. Def., 1948, 52, 305313.Google Scholar
Idem, Lancet, 1949, ii, 15.Google Scholar
Weil-Malherbe, H., Physiol. Rev., 1950, 30, 549568.Google Scholar
Weinland, W. L., Arch. Psychiat. Nervenkrankh., 1949, 183, 402417.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.