Interaction between prostaglandins of the E-type with a urinary component from halothane anaesthetized rats

Prostaglandins of the E-type (PGE's) were found to react or combine with a urinary metabolite of Halothane yielding products which left unrecovered during the purification procedure preceeding specific radioimmunoassay of PGE₂. The products were retained on sephadex LH-20 columns, and showed on thin layer silica gel plates (TLC) R_f values lower than those of the parent PGE-compounds. The product formation is supposed to involve the β-hydroxyketone system of PGE, since PG's of the F and A type were unaffected. The product formation could be avoided by inducing anaesthesia with Hexobarbitone and maintaining the anaesthesia with Halothane-nitrous oxide or it could be reveresed by adding barbiturates to urine samples obtained from animals anaesthetized with Halothane- nitroux oxide alone. The barbiturates effectively competed with PGE for the metabolite leaving PGE to behave normally on sephadex LH-20 and TLC, thus enabling us to evaluate correctly the PGE₂ content by RIA.