The pathogenesis of polyuria in diabetes insipidus

Polyuria and associated polydipsia are known to be the main, and often the only, symptoms of diabetes insipidus. The amount of urine excreted may reach enormous figures - 43 liters in the case of Trousseau. Specific gravity is at a very low level, reaching 1001 and below. Together with this disturbance of water exchange, the exchange of sodium chloride is usually disturbed, and these two processes, in fact, characterize diabetes insipidus. Regarding the origin, systematics, and pathogenesis of these basic symptoms there is a large literature, but even on the main questions there are still fundamental discrepancies.