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Studies in Human Physiology

VI. Variations in Blood Chemistry Over Long Periods of Time, Including Those Characteristic of Menstruation

Two Figures

Laboratories of Biochemistry and of Physiology, University of Buffalo, Buffalo, New York

This is the sixth and last of a series of reports dealing with intra-individual variation in a number of simultaneously determined physiological functions.

1. Statistics are given of the maximum and minimum, mode, mean, standard deviation and coefficient of variation for each of the following blood constituents; total non-protein, urea, amino acid, uric acid, total creatinine and undetermined nitrogen; sugar, cholesterol, inorganic phosphate, calcium, chloride and corpuscle volume.

2. Comparison of the coefficients of variation for the blood constituents and their urinary homologues (preceding paper) provides a statistical measure of the greater stability of the blood composition.

3. There is no correlation between the day-to-day, intraindividual variations of any of the blood constituents studied and similar variations in the basal metabolic rate.

4. There is evidence of menstrual variation as follows:
Cholesterol: rises during the week following menstruation; falls during the two following weeks; then begins to rise preceding the onset of the next menstrual period. Sugar and inorganic phosphate are doubtful but perhaps similar to cholesterol.
Calcium: highest during or just preceding menstruation and lowest midway of the intermenstrual period.
Chloride, uric acid and total creatinine: these show the most clear-cut cycles of any of the blood constituents, according to our data, and are highest during menstruation and lowest toward the end of the intermenstrual period.
Total non-protein, urea, amino acid and undetermined nitrogen: our data are doubtful but are in partial agreement with very trustworthy previous evidence for a cycle very similar to that for chloride, uric acid and total creatinine, above.
Blood-gas capacity (oxygen and carbon dioxid; from data in our third report) is lowest during menstruation and highest in the early part of the intermenstrual period.

5. There is evidence for seasonal variation as follows:
Chloride is lowest in the summer and highest in the winter; the same is true of the blood-carbon dioxid capacity (data from our third report).
Cholesterol, inorganic phosphate, amino acid, total creatinine, total non-protein and possibly, though less certainly, urea and undetermined nitrogen are highest during the summer or fall (July–September). For cholesterol and undertermined nitrogen the minima are in the winter (January); for the others it is during the spring (March–April). A similar variation is shown by the blood oxygen capacity (third report), while the corpuscle volume varies reciprocally, being highest in the spring and lowest in the fall.
Uric acid is very doubtful and calcium and sugar certainly give no evidence of seasonal variation.

6. By way of summary, attention is called to the evidence from our data of two major types of seasonal variation, roughly the reciprocal of each other: 1) Maximum in the winter and minimum in the summer; blood chloride and carbon dioxid capacity, urine volume, chloride and nitrogen excretion under basal conditions; weight and basal pulse and metabolic rate; 2) maximum in the summer or fall and minimum in the winter or (usually) spring: most of the blood constituents, as above; respiratory activity and urinary acid excretion under basal conditions.