[Somatostatin, a new hormone? (author's transl)]

Abstract

Somatostatin, or SRIF (Somatotropin Release Inhibiting Factor), is a tetradecapeptide of hypothalamic origin, which inhibits the secretion of growth hormone. It has also been recognized in other parts of the central nervous system, in the islets of Langerhans, and the mucosa of the upper digestive tract. Parenteral administration of synthetic SRIF inhibits the release of growth hormone, basal and stimulated by muscular exercise, arginine, L-DOPA, insulin-induced hypoglycemia, and sleeping. It also inhibits insulin and glucagon secretion, basal and stimulated, and several other secretory processes in endocrine and exocrine glands. It may have a depressor effect on some neurons in the central nervous system. Considerable interest has been prompted in the field of diabetology by the demonstration of somatostatin-induced suppression of growth hormone and glucagon : both hormones are over-secreted in many diabetic patients, and both may be noxious for small blood vessels in the diabetic. The eventual therapeutic use of somatostatin in humans is restricted, for the moment, by the unavaibility of long-acting SRIF preparations and the possibility of some adverse effects mainly affecting hemostasis. Evaluation of the physiological role (s) for this newcomer, and of the eventual pathophysiology of endogenous somatostatin, represent an unexpected and exciting field of neuro-endocrinology.