Yvon Calmus, Pierre Gane, Philippe Rouger, Raoul Poupon – 1 January 1990 – Aberrant hepatic expression of HLA molecules has been shown to be present in primary biliary cirrhosis and may play a determining role in the pathogenesis of the disease. We have studied the effect of the long‐term administration of ursodeoxycholic acid on hepatic HLA expression. Nine untreated patients with primary biliary cirrhosis, eight patients treated for at least a year with ursodeoxycholic acid and eight control subjects without hepatobiliary disease were compared.

Jill E. Maddison, Dorothy K. Leong, Peter R. Dodd, Graham A. R. Johnston – 1 January 1990 – Significant discrepancy exists between radioreceptor and high‐performance liquid chromatographic estimates of plasma GABA concentrations in animal models of hepatic encephalopathy. A possible explanation for this discrepancy is the presence in plasma of a substance that can inhibit [3H]‐GABA binding but is not GABA itself.

Robert S. Britton, Rosemary O'Neill, Bruce R. Bacon – 1 January 1990 – Peroxidative decomposition of mitochondrial membrane phospholipids with subsequent mitochondrial dysfunctin is a postulated mechanism of liver cell injury in parenchymal iron overload. Malondialdehyde is formed when polyunsaturated fatty acids of membrane phospholipids undergo peroxidative decomposition, and it is metabolized by aldehyde dehydrogenase. We studied mitochondrial metabolism of malondialdehyde in rats with chronic dietary iron overload.

James K. Stoller, Douglas Moodie, William A. Schiavone, David Vogt, Thomas Broughan, Eugene Winkelman, Patrice K. Rehm, William D. Carey – 1 January 1990 – This report describes a patient with marked hypoxemia caused by intrapulmonary shunt associated with primary biliary cirrhosis. Liver transplantation resulted in resolution of digital clubbing and reduction of intrapulmonary shunt as demonstrated by normalization of room air arterial blood gases, reduction in shunt fraction and normalization of the indocyanin‐enhanced echocardiogram and perfusion lung scan.

Ansgar W. Lohse, Michael Manns, Hans‐Peter Dienes, Karl‐Hermann Meyer Zum Büschenfelde, Irun R. Cohen – 1 January 1990 – This study describes a murine model of autoimmune hepatitis: experimental autoimmune hepatitis. Experimental autoimmune hepatitis could be induced most effectively in male C57BL/6 mice by intraperitoneal immunization with the 100,000 g superantant of syngeneic liver homogenate (S‐100) in complete Freund's adjuvant. BALB/C and C3H mice were less susceptible than C57BL/6 mice. Experimental autoimmune hepatitis could not be induced in Lewis rats.

1 January 1990

1 January 1990

Kazushige Beppu, Makoto Hashizume – 1 January 1990 – In 40 patients with cirrhosis and esophageal varices, transmural variceal pressure was assessed endoscopically by fine needle puncture and related to endoscopicsigns as well as to the severity of liver disease. Transmural pressure was significantly (p < 0.01) higher in the presence of a red color sign (26.7[7.8] cm H2O) than in its absence (19.1 [6.6] cm H2).

Elizabeth E. Powell, W. Graham E. Cooksley, Reginald Hanson, Jeffrey Searle, June W. Halliday, W. Powell – 1 January 1990 – Forty‐two patients with nonalcoholic steatohepatitis were followed for a median of 4.5 yr (range = 1.5 to 21.5 yr). Except for two patients with lipodystrophy, all were obeser; 35 o f42 were women, 26 of 32 were hyperlipidemic and 15 were hyperglycemic. Upper abdominal pain was the most common reason for presentation.

Kazuhiko Hosoda, Masao Omata, Katsuo Uchiumi, Fumio Imazeki, Osamu Yokosuka, Yoshimi Ito, Kunio Okuda, Masao Ohto – 1 January 1990 – Replication of duck hepatitis B virus in extrahepatic tissue such as pancreas, kidney and spleen has been well documented. To assess whether there is more widespread extraheptic virus replication, we assayed brain, heart, lung, thymus, pancreas, kidney, spleen and intestine of 1‐ to‐wk‐old ducklings for the presence of duck hepatitis B virus DNA and mRNA by blotting in in situ methods.