{"id":5347,"date":"2013-01-07T15:46:52","date_gmt":"2013-01-07T21:46:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/?p=5347"},"modified":"2021-09-06T12:02:09","modified_gmt":"2021-09-06T17:02:09","slug":"glandular-therapy-back-in-the-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/blog\/2013\/01\/07\/glandular-therapy-back-in-the-news","title":{"rendered":"Glandular Therapy Back in the News"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I\u2019ve always been intrigued by glandular therapies, in which dried animal endocrine gland is used to treat a variety of medical conditions. And while I appreciate their medical benefits (like everything, some work better than others), even more interesting is their role in the history of medicine over the past century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just when I thought everyone had forgotten about glandulars except a few doctors writing prescriptions for Armour thyroid (made from dried pig thyroid) and naturopaths, who use glandulars regularly, up pops an article–in the New York Times business section no less–on glandular therapy<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once the whipping boy of conventional medicine, glandulars are back, now basking in the golden glow of serious money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A history marred by goat testicles\u2026<\/b><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Glandular therapy was first taken seriously by physicians in the 19th century, when it was discovered that dried porcine thyroid gland could treat underactive thyroid and dried animal-based adrenal glands could treat Addison\u2019s disease. Before this, neither condition was controllable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the years passed, doctors tried other glands with varying rates of success: ovaries for infertility and menopause, testicles for faltering male sex drive, thymus for the immune system, and pancreas for digestion. Later, research moved well beyond glands. Concentrated spleen was tried for anemia, heart for cardiac diseases, lung for pulmonary conditions–even brain for Alzheimer\u2019s. To give you an idea of how seriously medicine took glandular therapies, the 1925 textbook Medical Glandular Therapy<\/i> was published as a joint project between the AMA and the University of Chicago, edited by Frank Billings, MD, for whom a U of C hospital was later named.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Historically, glandular therapy has been rife with extremes. At one end we have Mayo Clinic rheumatologist Philip S. Hench, MD, who after decades of research was awarded a Nobel Prize for his work with adrenal and pituitary hormones (again, extracted from animals). At the other extreme is medical history\u2019s most notorious charlatan, John R. Brinkley<\/a>, and please do click to read more about this provocative man. During some of the same years Dr Hench was researching glandulars, Brinkley owned an empire of clinics and hospitals (as well as, oddly, radio stations), literally getting away with murder by implanting goat testicles into the scrotums of old men seeking eternal youth and into women seeking fertility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s a logic to legitimate glandular therapy: that the gland or organ of a mammal that is structurally close to its human version would contain all the micronutrients needed to bolster proper function in people. A few highlights:<\/p>\n\n\n\n