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A physician has an ethical duty to hold in confidence communications made to him by his patient. A legal recognition of this ethical duty is found in the concept of privilege, which is the subject of this article. January 1967 will bring to California physicians a new protection for patients' communications. The physician-patient privilege has been redefined to include confidential communications made during diagnostic evaluation, those made to non-licensed physicians, interns and medical aides, and those overheard by eavesdroppers. There has been added a psychotherapist-patient privilege designed to facilitate communications required in psychotherapy as well as in behavioral research. This paper first presents a brief historical background and discusses the protections and limitations afforded by the new California Evidence Code. There follows a section on the psychotherapist-patient privilege with the recommendation that in the context of psychotherapy, patients of physicians who are not psychiatrists should be afforded the additional benefits of the psychotherapist-patient privilege. Lastly, advice is given concerning the physician's conduct in relation to his duty to claim privilege under the new code.

After biosynthesis of norepinephrine was inhibited, treatment of rats for 10 days with rubidium chloride (0.6 milliequivalent per kilogram of body weight) caused an increase in the rate of disappearance of norepinephrine in the brainstem but not in the telencephalon. Also the utilization of intracisternally injected tritiated norepinephrine was increased and was accompanied by a shift in the pattern of norepinephrine metabolism to normetanephrine. These data suggest that greater amounts of neuronally stored norepinephrine were released to central adrenergic receptors.

The activity of-phenylethanolamine N-methyltransferase in mice of the C57Bl/Ka strain was determined after a 4 degrees C stress. The enzyme activity increased 1.2-fold at the end of 3 hours and by 1.4-fold by the end of 6 hours of the stress. The results are in contrast to those from other species with intact animals in which the enzyme changes only after several days of chronic stress. Cycloheximide prevents the rise in enzyme activity, suggesting the increase may be due to protein synthesis. The increase may provide a model system for studying regulation of catecholamine biosynthetic enzymes.

The behavior of 12 male cats was observed before and after six or eight daily injections of parachlorophenylalanine. Sexual performance was either unchanged or diminished; aggressive behavior was not seen. Serotonin concentrations in the brains were uniformly lowered.

Epinephrine given intravenously or intraventricularly has a half-life in the brain of the rat of 2 to 2.5 hours. After intravenous administration of the drug the principal route of metabolism is O-methylation, whereas after intraventricular administration the principal route is conjugation.

A genetic analysis of differences in adrenal phenylethanolamine N-methyltransferase (EC 2.1.1.X) and tyrosine hydroxylase (EC 1.99.1.X.) and brain tyrosine hydroxylase was performed in three inbred mouse strains. In adrenal glands, the pattern of inheritance of both enzymes was similar; genes carried by the CBA/J strain appeared to be dominant to those of the other strains. The pattern of inheritance of tyrosine hydroxylase activity in adrenals differed from that in the brain. In both tissues, dominant genes appeared to determine intermediate, rather than extreme, levels of enzyme activities.