[Neuroendocrine aspects of the pathogenesis and treatment of disseminated sclerosis and lateral amyotrophic sclerosis].

Comparative study of neurologic, immunologic, and endocrinologic signs of disseminated sclerosis and lateral amyotrophic sclerosis was carried out by radioimmunoassay, monoclonal antibodies, and microcytotoxic Terasaki's test. The data have shown a tendency to hyperthyroid and hypocorticoid states in 60 percent of lateral amyotrophic sclerosis patients. Fluctuations in hormonal levels of disseminated sclerosis patients were quite the opposite in 37.5 percent of cases. Thyrotropic hormone content was rarely changed (in 20 and 18.75 percent of cases, respectively), this permitting a conclusion on the possibility of an extrahypophyseal (thymic) effect on the thyroid in these conditions and on the advisability of using thyrotropin- and corticotropin-releasing hormones (8-arginine-vasopressin) in combined therapy thereof.