Clinical Experience with Medium-Chain Triglycerides (MCT) (Report 1)

In a study representing an attempt to evaluate clinical effectiveness of medium-chain triglycerides (MCT) 8-ONO in malnutrition, a series of thirty-one hospitalized patients were treated with the drug given either by means of tube feeding or by oral route.1) One patient with reticulosarcoma cutis, one with laryngeal carcinoma and three subjects with malabsorption syndrome received the drug by tube feeding. The dose was 240g q. d. (67.2g a day as Trioctanoin) in the case of cutaneous reticulosarcoma and 90g q. d. (or 25.2g Trioctanoin) in the cases of cancer of the larynx and malabsorption syndrome. Evident improvement in general status and associated marked weight gain and increase in serum total protein and in serum total cholesterol resulted from the treatment.2) The drug was administered orally as an additive in soup, milk or cooked eggs, in doses ranging from 40 to 60g (or 11.2 to 11.8g as Trioctanoin) a day postoperatively to a series of twenty-five gastrectomized patients. In comparison to a control group of untreated patients, the patients receiving the drug displayed apparently faster recovery as to weight gain, serum total proteins, etc.3) The drug was given both by tube feeding and by oral route to a patient with carcinoma of the rectum. Significant amelioration in the results of various laboratory tests was evident following administration of MCT in this patient as in the foregoing cases.The results stress clinical effectiveness of MCT as a nutrient in various states of malnutrition.