EFFECTS OF IMIPRAMINE AND RESERPINE ON BODY SIZE AND ORGAN SIZE IN EUTHYROID AND HYPERTHYROID GROWING RATS

¹ Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina, School of Medicine, Chapel Hill, North Carolina

Young male rats were chronically injected with reserpine, imipramine or saline, each in combination with thyroxin or NaOH blank. After 14 days of drug treatment (10 days of thyroxin treatment), the animals were killed by suffocation. Anoxia survival time, body weight and weight of heart, kidney, liver, testes and spleen were studied as dependent variables. Data were analyzed by analysis of variance after correction for initial body weight and again for final body weight. The effects of thyroxin on all variables corroborated the findings of previous reports. Only one thyroxin-drug interactive effect was isolated. Thyroxin alone decreased body weight; reserpine had no significant effect. Together they interactively decreased it. Several organ-specific drug effects were demonstrated. Opposite effects on testes weight of reserpine (increase) and imipramine (decrease) were of special interest.