[Thyroid hormone levels after surgical stress reaction (author's transl)].

In a larger collective of surgical patients the behaviour of the individual thyroid parameters (T4, T3, rT3, TBG and thyroxine-binding capacity) were studied before, during and after operation and set in relation to each other. There are significant shifts in T4 metabolism towards the formation of rT3. In spite of its greatly reduced metabolic activity compared with T3, an important regulatory effect is attributed to rT3, in thyroid metabolism in stress situations.