Urinary peptide excretion in the burned patient.

RONOUNCED CHANGES IN NIThOGEN METABOLISM are known to occur as the result of a serious burn (1-8). Although considerable information is available on these changes, little attention has been given to the quantitative excretion of peptides in the urine of the burned patient. Such an assay has interesting theoretical possibilities. The nitrogenous products in the urine come from ingested food and body tissues. Since it is unlikely that urinary peptide excretion is direct from digested food (9, 10), it was felt that they probably originate in body tissues. Thus, liberation of peptides may be a reflection of tissue destruction or cellular disorganization, and this in turn could conceivably be a reflection of a major factor in the physiology of a burned patient. In this report the urinary peptide loss will be correlated with the clinical estimate of the seriously burned patient. In so doing we will attempt to show how this relatively simple determination may be used to provide important information concerning the clinical condition of such a patient.