Tomas Sveger, Sten Eriksson – 1 August 1995 – Of 200,000 Swedish infants screened for α1‐antitrypsin deficiency (α1ATD), 184 (127 PiZ, 2 PiZ–, 54 PiSZ, and 1 PiS–) children have been followed prospectively, of whom 1 PiSZ and 5 PiZ children died in early childhood. We now report clinical and biochemical signs of liver disease in adolescence and the prognosis of neonatal liver disease up to the age of 18 years. The α1ATD subjects were offered a clinical checkup and liver tests at 16 and 18 years of age, 150 of 178 α1ATD subjects undergoing checkups at age 16 and 166 at age 18.

Ramon Estruch, Joaquim Fernández‐Solá, Emilio Sacanella, Carles Paré, Emanuel Rubin, Alvaro Urbano‐Márquez – 1 August 1995 – Based on anecdotal impressions, there is a common clinical perception that alcoholics with liver disease do not develop cardiomyopathy and that those with alcohol‐induced cardiac disease are spared cirrhosis.

Paul A. Cahill, Cory Foster, Eileen M. Redmond, Cindy Gingalewski, Yuping Wu, James V. Sitzmann – 1 August 1995 – Portal hypertension (PHT) is characterized by splanchnic hyperemia caused by a reduction in mesenteric vascular resistance. Mediators of this hyperemia include nitric oxide (NO). This is based on several reports indicating a marked splanchnic hyporesponsiveness in PHT to vasoconstrictor stimuli, both in vitro and in vivo, and a subsequent reversal using specific inhibitors of NO synthase (NOS).

Loren Laine – 1 August 1995

Masafumi Naito, Norio Hayashi, Toyoki Moribe, Hideki Hagiwara, Eiji Mita, Yoshiyuki Kanazawa, Akinori Kasahara, Hideyuki Fusamoto, Takenobu Kamada – 1 August 1995 – Hepatitis C virus (HCV) has been reported to conform to a quasispecies nature, which is most evident in hypervariable regions of the putative envelope 2 domain. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between the nucleotide complexity and diversity of hypervariable region 1 and various stages of the carrier states.

Anne‐Marie Steffan, Carlos Augusto Pereira, Annick Bingen, Michele Valle, Jean‐Pierre Martin, Françoise Koehren, Cathy Royer, Jean‐Louis Gendrault, André Kirn – 1 August 1995 – Fenestrations of hepatic endothelial cells play an active role as a sieving barrier allowing extensive exchange between the blood and liver parenchyma. Alteraction of these structures may be induced in the course of various pathological events and provoke important perturbations of liver function.

Bruno Turlin, Frédéric Juguet, Romain Moirand, Danielle Le Quilleuc, Olivier Loréal, Jean‐Pierre Campion, Bernard Launois, Marie‐Paule Ramée, Pierre Brissot, Yves Deugnier – 1 August 1995 – Iron was systematically studied in the nontumorous liver of 24 patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) developed on a noncirrhotic liver compared with 4 control groups (cirrhosis with and without HCC, liver metastasis, and normal liver) matched according to age, sex, and presence of chronic alcoholism.

Shunji Narumi, John P. Roberts, Jean C. Emond, John Lake, Nancy L. Ascher – 1 August 1995 – The clinical course of 37 patients who underwent 46 liver transplantations for primary (n = 33) and secondary (n = 4) sclerosing cholangitis was reviewed. The median follow‐up was 37 months. The patient and graft survivals for patients with primary sclerosing cholangitis at 1, 2, and 5 years were 96.9%, 91.6%, 87.9%, and 83.1%, 74.2%, 65.2%, respectively.

Gin‐Ho Lo, Kwok‐Hung Lai, Jing‐Shiung Cheng, Jia‐Huey Hwu, Chia‐Fu Chang, Sam‐Ming Chen, Hung‐Ting Chiang – 1 August 1995 – We conducted a prospective, randomized trial comparing sclerotherapy and ligation in 120 patients with acute bleeding of esophageal varices. All the patients were cirrhotic, 59 received sclerotherapy, and 61 received ligation. Treatment was repeated regularly until the varices were obliterated. The mean follow‐up period was 295 ± 120 days and 310 ± 105 days for the sclerotherapy and ligation groups, respectively.

Laurie C. Miller, Archna Sharma, Augusta F. McKusick, Joseph P. Tassoni, Charles A. Dinarello, Marshall M. Kaplan – 1 August 1995 – Primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC) is a chronic, progressive, cholestatic liver disease. Interleukin‐1β (IL‐1β) may play a role in the pathogenesis of PBC by contributing to altered immune function and fibrosis. Colchicine or methotrexate has some beneficial effects in the treatment of PBC, and also affects interleukin‐1 (IL‐1).