THE ULTRASTRUCTURE OF LIVER CELLS IN WOMEN UNDER STEROID THERAPY

Abstract

ABSTRACT An electron microscope study was carried out on liver biopsies of fourteen young healthy women under different types of contraceptive therapy. Six women had received an oestrogen-free progestogen (chlormadinone acetate) daily in microdoses for 38 to 44 months. Four were under a combination of oestrogens and progestogens for 63 to 104 months, and four were under sequential therapy, three of these during a six month period and one for a period of 67 months. Liver biopsies were taken from eight women as control material. The changes found in subjects under contraceptive therapy were a moderate dilatation and vesiculation of the rough and smooth surfaced endoplasmic reticulum both in the women treated with microdoses of progestogens, and in those treated with a combination of progestogens and oestrogens. A more marked vesiculation of this organelle was present in those women under sequential medication. Elongation of mitochondria with crystalloid inclusions in their matrices was found in 5 to 10% of the whole population of mitochondria per cell examined in the chlormadinone treated women. The same changes were seen in 20 to 40% in women with combined and sequential therapy. In one case of this last group the mitochondrial modifications were found in more than 60%. Other changes included fatty vacuolation which was more marked when combined and sequential types of treatment were given. Control biopsies were considered as normal. All these changes are regarded as reversible and are thought to represent a response of the liver parenchymal cell to the presence of steroid hormones.