Secretin and Portal Blood Flow

Abstract

Using a duplex Doppler technique, we investigated the effect of low doses of secretin on the portal blood flow. In eight healthy volunteers successive intravenous secretin infusions of 0, 8, and 32pmol × kg⁻¹ × h⁻¹ resulted in proportional increases in plasma secretin levels. The portal venous flow, however, was unaffected. A bolus injection of 930 pmol of secretin caused plasma secretin levels to increase 100-fold, whereas blood flow in the portal vein increased only by a factor three. This suggests that secretin in the present dose range is of no quantitative importance as a regulator of portal venous flow under physiologic conditions.

Key Words:

• Duplex Doppler
• portal blood flow
• secretin