[Studies on the relationship between the endotoxin induced fever and the antipyretic effect of reserpine in rabbits (author's transl)].

It has been well documented that fever could be mediated with endogenous pyrogen released from reticuloendothelial system(RES) by administration of bacterial endotoxin(LPS) intravenously to rabbits. On the contrary, reserpine which has various pharmacological activities by depleting catecholamines decreases the normal body temperature as well as endotoxin induced fever. In this paper, we focussed our attention on the effect of reserpine on the production of endogenous pyrogen with relation to the antipyretic effect in endotoxin fever and obtained the following results: Endogenous pyrogen could be detected by intravenous administration of LPS(0.5 micrograms/kg) during the fever. However, endogenous pyrogen was undetectable with intracisternal administration of LPS(0.01 microgram/body) which provoked long-lasting fever. Reserpine (1 mg/kg, i.v.) decreased both body temperature induced by intracisternal administration of LPS(0.01 microgram/body) or intravenous administration of LPS(0.5 microgram/kg), however the degree was more extensive in cases of LPS-induced fever. Pretreatment of rabbits with reserpine (1 mg/kg, i.v.) suppressed the fever induced by an intravenous administration of LPS(0.5 microgram/kg), but did not suppress the release of endogenous pyrogen. These data suggest that endogenous pyrogen may not be an important factor in the pathogenesis of endotoxin fever.