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Secretion Rates of LH and FSH During Infusion of LH-FSH/RH in Normal Women and in Patients with Secondary Amenorrhea: Suggestive Evidence for Two Pools of LH and FSH

Laboratory of Experimental Medicine and Clinic for Gynecological Endocrinology and Infertility, Department of Developmental Biology Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium

Normal women in the early follicular phase and in the luteal phase of the cycle, and patients with secondary amenorrhea received on consecutive days a rapid intravenous injection (50 µg) and a two or four-hour infusion (25 µg/h) of synthetic LH-FSH/RH. The responses of LH and FSH were evaluated by the measured plasma concentrations, as well as by the calculated pituitary secretion rates and by the amounts of hormone released. To estimate these pituitary secretion rates of LH and FSH, a simplified mathematical model is proposed.

During an infusion of LH-FSH/RH the secretion rates of both LH and FSH increased in the three groups of women in a biphasic way with a dip after 1 to 2 h of infusion, suggesting that besides the pool mobilized by a rapid intravenous injection of LH-FSH/RH there is a second pool of (stored) gonadotropins.

For LH the increase above baseline concentrations was higher in group II (luteal phase) than in group 1 (follicular phase) or in group III (amenorrhea) and this both after a bolus injection and during infusion of LH-FSH/RH. For FSH a similar pattern of response prevailed during an infusion of LH-FSH/RH. After a bolus administration, however, the FSH release was relatively higher in group III (amenorrhea) than in both groups of normal women in which the increases were about the same. The latter finding suggests that the first pool of FSH is released by a different mechanism than the second pool.

^* Aspirant of the N.F.W.O.

^** Endocrinology and Nutrition Unit, Universitè Catholique, Louvain.

Received August 11, 1975.

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