1 June 1989

Brian J. McMahon – 1 June 1989 – To combat hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection in Taiwan, a mass immunoprophylaxis program was launched on July 1, 1984, aiming first at prevention of chronic HBV carriage from perinatal mother‐to‐infant infection. In the first 15‐month period, 352721 (78%) of 450585 pregnant women were screened for hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg); HBsAg was present in 62359 (18%), with 50% of them categorized as highly infectious.

Raymond S. Koff – 1 June 1989 – A survey of 434 oral surgeons was conducted to examine risk factors for hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. Overall, 112 (26%) of the participants demonstrated serologic evidence of past or current infection with HBV. Seropositivity was significantly associated with age, number of years in practice, and year of graduation from dental school but not with other variables examined, such as the number of patients seen annually or the number of patients seen who were at high risk of HBV infection.

William F. Balistreri – 1 June 1989

David Kravetz, Jaime Bosch, Maite Arderiu, M. Pilar Pizcueta, Juan Rodés – 1 June 1989 – The present study investigated whether, in rats with portal hypertension due to cirrhosis of the liver induced by carbon tetrachloride, blood volume restitution following a hemorrhage produces an increase of portal pressure beyond control values, as observed in rats with prehepatic portal hypertension.

Masao Arai, Shigeo Nakano, Fumio Okuno, Yoshiaki Hirano, Kazufumi Sujita, Toshiji Kobayashi, Hiromasa Ishii, Masaharu Tsuchiya – 1 June 1989 – The present experiments were designed to study the effect of chronic ethanol consumption on endotoxin toxicity. The intravenous injection of endotoxin produced a more pronounced increase of serum AST and ALT activities in chronic ethanol‐fed rats, when compared to controls.

Torben Jørgensen – 1 June 1989 – To date, it has never been established which symptoms are specifically caused by stones in the gallbladder. To examine this issue, the relationship between occurrence of gallstone disease diagnosed by ultrasonography and complaints about abdominal pain and discomfort was assessed in a random sample comprising 4,581 males and females, of whom 3,608 (79%) took part in the investigation.

William G. M. Hardison, Philip J. Lowe, Miya Shanahan – 1 June 1989 – The permeability pathway into the biliary tree for small inert molecules exhibits a charge selectivity. Using a method which distinguishes trans‐ from paracellular access, we have examined the charge selectivity of biliary access pathways for the 40‐kD protein horseradish peroxidase (pI 7.5), which was derivatized to strongly anionic (pI < 3.5) and strongly cationic (pI > 9.5) isoenzymes.

Atilla Ertan – 1 June 1989

Richard A. Galbraith, Attallah Kappas – 1 June 1989 – Tin‐mesoporphyrin shares many of the properties of its parent compound, tin‐protoporphyrin. These include competitive inhibition of heme oxygenase, amelioration of jaundice and suppression of chemically induced hepatic porphyria. Tin‐mesoporphyrin is cleared from the plasma of normal subjects with dose‐dependent pharmacokinetics (T1/2 = 3.8 hr following i.v. administration of 1 μmole per kg body weight), and small amounts (<1% of administered dose) are excreted into the urine and feces.