THE ACTIONS OF EXOGENOUS DEHYDROEPIANDROSTERONE IN EXPERIMENTAL-ANIMALS AND HUMANS

Dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) is the major adrenal steroid of young ad ults; however, its physiologic functions, if any, are not known. The p urpose of this review is to evaluate the current literature in which D HEA was administered to either humans or experimental animals to disce rn what these functions might be. Reports are divided into five areas: neurologic, immunologic, cardiovascular, oncologic, and metabolic. Pa rticular attention is paid to the dosage and route of administration. This type of analysis shows that at the lowest doses, DHEA has effects on neurologic and immunologic tissues, suggesting that these two site s may be physiologic targets. DHEA also affects cardiologic and metabo lic functions as well as tumor growth, but such actions require higher doses and may reflect 'pharmacologic' activities. It is proposed that DHEA's pattern of activity represents a new class of steroid hormones , the ''Regnantoids.'' Further progress in the endocrinology of this f amily of steroids may only come when synthetic, long-acting analogs of DHEA are available for in vitro studies to allow correlations between hormone action and receptor binding.