William R. Treem, Piero Rinaldo, Daniel E. Hale, Charles A. Stanley, David S. Millington, Jeffrey S. Hyams, Sandra Jackson, Douglass M. Turnbull – 1 February 1994 – The pathogenesis of acute fatty liver of pregnancy is unknown, but similarities in the clinical presentation and the histological appearance of the liver with those found in children with metabolic defects in the intra‐mitochondrial β‐oxidation pathway of the liver suggest that a disturbance in hepatic fatty acid oxidation may play a role.

Franco Trevisani, Mauro Bernardi, Vincenzo Arienti, Pietro Scrivano, Alighieri Mazziotti, Antonino Cavallari, Daniela Patrono, Sandro Piazzi, Giuseppe Gozzetti, Giovanni Gasbarrini – 1 February 1994 – Levels of plasma amino acids, ammonia, glucagon and insulin and their 5‐hr responses to a protein feeding were evaluated before and sequentially (3 mo and 1 yr) after distal splenorenal shunt in 10 patients with cirrhosis belonging to Child‐Pugh's class A or B. An index of glucagon effectiveness (plasma glucose/glucagon) was also calculated.

Silvio Magrin, Antonio Craxi, Carmelo Fabiano, Rosa Giovanna Simonetti, Germana Fiorentino, Liliana Marino, Orazia Diquattro, Vito Di Marco, Oreste Loiacono, Riccardo Volpes, Piero Almasio, Mickey S. Urdea, Paul Neuwald, Ray Sanchez‐Pescador, Jill Detmer, Judith C. Wilber, Luigi Pagliaro – 1 February 1994 – We assessed the pattern of hepatitis C viremia in chronic liver disease by studying 100 hepatitis C virus antibody–positive patients: 48 with chronic hepatitis, 21 with cirrhosis and 31 with hepatocellular carcinoma and cirrhosis.

Raymond S. Koff – 1 February 1994

Shinji Osada, Yukio Okano, Shigetoyo Saji, Yoshinori Nozawa – 1 February 1994 – A considerable fraction of freshly prepared hepatocytes loaded with the fluorescent [Ca2+]i indicator fura‐2 exhibited spontaneous rhythmic fluctuations that tended to decrease with increasing length of incubation after isolation. These oscillations were dependent on the external Ca2+. They could no longer be observed when a Ca2+ chelator–(ethylenebis [oxyethylenenitrilo]) tetraacetic acid–was added to medium.

Grant A. Ramm, Lawrie W. Powell, June W. Halliday – 1 February 1994 – We have previously shown that the clearance of exogenous ferritin and the release of endogenous ferritin into both serum and bile are altered by the microtubular inhibitor colchicine. In this study we further examined the role of the lysosome‐endosome pathway in ferritin metabolism.

George Marinos, Heather M. Smith, Nikolai V. Naoumov, Roger Williams – 1 February 1994 – Serum IgM anti‐HBc was determined in 135 chronic HBsAg carriers with various categories of histological activity on liver biopsy and hepatitis B serological profile. Thirty‐three patients were treated with interferon‐α to investigate the correlation between serum IgM anti‐HBc with histological activity and viral replication, to evaluate the usefulness of pretreatment IgM anti‐HBc as a predictor of a successful response to interferon‐α and to examine the IgM anti‐HBc response during this treatment.

Jon W. Gordon – 1 February 1994

1 February 1994

Steven A. Rogers, Daniel K. Podolsky – 1 February 1994 – Primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) predisposes to the development of cholangiocarcinoma, a usually fatal complication that is difficult to diagnose. Serum concentrations of CA 19‐9, a tumor‐associated antigen, are frequently increased in patients with only cholangiocarcinoma. The aim of this study was to assess the value of an increased serum CA 19‐9 level for the diagnosis of cholangiocarcinoma in patients with preexisting PSC.