STUDIES OF SERUM ELECTROLYTES: V. Urinary Electrolyte Excretion in Pneumonia.

In a previous paper (1) one of us has presented studies of weight and nitrogen and chloride balance in pneumoma. It is probable that the changes studied could have been more readily interpreted had we had full information with respect to the other electrolytes as well as with respect to chlorides. To obtain this was not at the time practical. Wehave, however, data on the urinary excretion of fixed base, sulphate and phosphate from the same subjects over the same period of days in pooled specimens of urine each representing the combined collection of urine from a subject for those consecutive days during which the chloride excretion had been fairly constant. These data are presented and discussed in this paper. Case numbers are the same as in the previous paper. Total base was measured by Fiske's method (2), inorganic sulphate by Folin's method (3) and phosphate by Briggs' method (4). The figures. for phosphate excretion are expressed as m.Eq. which have been calculated by assuming 1.8 m.Eq. per mM. of P04. In order that we might have some standard with which to compare the rates of excretion of these electrolytes in our patients with pneumonia we placed two normal subjects for 2 days on a similar dietary intake and had them undergo severe sweating in a cabinet light bath on each of the 2 days; Wehave made our comparisons with the second day of study of these normal subjects. Furthermore, in, order to compare the patients, who differed greatly in size, all excre-