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Glucocorticoids

المؤلف:  Norman, A. W., & Henry, H. L.

المصدر:  Hormones

الجزء والصفحة:  3rd edition , p223

2026-08-19

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Glucocorticoids are a family of steroid hormones that are essential to life. The primary glucocorticoid is cortisol. It acts on different cells in a variety of different ways. Without the secretion of cortisol during stress, a human could not survive. Even in patients who lack the ability to secrete cortisol from the adrenals in the face of stress, the oral administration of a glucocorticoid can be beneficial.

An important result of glucocorticoid action is to stimulate the production of glycogen, especially in the liver, and to maintain blood glucose concentration. The process of gluconeogenesis is a classic biochemical transformation of noncarbohydrate “carbon,” e.g., glycerol, pyruvate, lactose, glucogenic amino acids (e.g., glutamine, alanine and all the amino acids of the TCA cycle), and fatty acids with an odd number of carbons, into glucose for storage as glycogen.

The primary focus of this chapter is to describe the bio logical functions of six steroids important to or related to the glucocorticoids and three important steroid drug forms. However, these nine biologically important steroids are a small number compared to the ~100 steroids that are covered in Chapter 2, which also provides an extensive review of the fundamental chemistry of steroids and their biological production by a large family of steroid enzymes which are required to convert cholesterol into each of the steroids that have functions in human cells.