Medicine: Hormones

Nobody really knows much about the gland-made hormones which influence personality, body shape, health. But what hormones do is often big news. Last week hormones made news in the treatment of acne and cancer:

¶ Seventeen young women suffered from severe acne associated with menstrual disorders. After injections of pregnant-mare serum (a blood extract rich in pituitary hormone), all but three of them developed clear skins, normal menses. Doctors are leary of sex-hormone treatment for acne—it has been "disappointing" in the past —but Drs. Charles Howard Birnberg and Charles Robert Rein of New York City believe that pregnant mare's serum is effective...

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