[Urine steroid profiles of hirsute women (author's transl)]

Steroid profiles of women suffering from idiopathic hirsutism show in more than 50% of the cases of 10--100 fold increase in the excretion of dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) compared with normal values. The excretion of DHEA was reduced much more than that of other 17-ketosteroids if the adrenals (NNR) were suppressed by dexamethasone (DXM). Within one week they reached values at the compound noise level of the gas chromatograms. If the ovaries were stimulated with human chorionic gonadotropin during continued suppression of the NNR with DXM no increase of DHEA could be detected.