Antonina Smedile, Mario Rizzetto, Katherine Denniston, Ferruccio Bonino, Frances Wells, Giorgio Verme, Fausto Consolo, Bill Hoyer, Robert H. Purcell, John L. Gerin – 1 November 1986 – Hepatitis D virus is a defective human pathogen that requires hepatitis B virus for its replication. A hybridization‐based assay for the 1.75 kb RNA genome of hepatitis D virus was developed using as probe a radiolabeled transcript of a cloned cDNA fragment (pKD3 hepatitis D virus DNA).

Bernardo Buitrago, Hans Popper, Stephen C. Hadler, Swan N. Thung, Michael A. Gerber, Robert H. Purcell, James E. Maynard – 1 November 1986 – Stimulated by observations in an outbreak of hepatitis δ‐virus infection among Yucpa Indians in Venezuela, in which unusual histologic features were found, we studied 100 cases of fatal hepatitis from Colombia, South America, which had been obtained by autopsy or viscerotomy. These cases were considered to be “Santa Marta hepatitis,” or “hepatitis of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta,” which has been observed in this region for more than 40 years.

G. S. Tint – 1 November 1986 – A two‐year‐old boy presented with severe failure to thrive, developmental delay, anemia, hepatosplenomegaly, central cataracts, and dysmorphic features. Quantitative analyses of urinary organic acids revealed massive excretion of mevalonic acid, a metabolic precursor of cholesterol and nonsterol isoprenes: 46,000 to 56,200 mmol per mole of creatinine, as compared with 0.2 to 0.3 mmol per mole in normal children. The mevalonic acid concentration in plasma was also greatly increased at 440 μmol per liter (normal, <0.05).

Deane F. Mosher – 1 November 1986

Antonio Francavilla, Alfredo Dileo, Lorenzo Polimeno, Judith Gavaler, Riccardo Pellicci, Satoro Todo, Igal Kam, John Prelich, Leonard Makowka, Thomas E. Starzl – 1 November 1986 – Galactosamine induces a dose‐dependent hepatic injury in rats and many other animals. The toxicity of D‐galactosamine appears to be a consequence of the loss of hepatic UTP. It has previously been reported that regenerating liver cytosol is able to prevent, at least in part, the lethal effect of this substance by stimulating hepatic regeneration.

Prem V. Nair, Myron J. Tong, Douglas Stevenson, Deborah Roskamp, Cissy Boone – 1 November 1986 – We investigated the efficacy of a short course of prednisone therapy in 20 patients with histologic evidence of chronic active hepatitis B. Sixteen of 20 prednisone‐treated patients who were initially serum hepatitis B virus DNA‐positive had a transient elevation of their serum ALT activity on withdrawal of prednisone. Subsequently, 14 of these 16 patients (87.5%) became persistently negative for serum hepatitis B virus DNA, and 10 also lost their HBeAg.

Marco Zoli, Giulio Marchesini, Alessandra Brunori, Maria Rita Cordiani, Emilio Pisi – 1 November 1986 – The drugs currently under investigation in the prevention of recurrent gastrointestinal bleeding in cirrhosis are likely to decrease the portal pressure by means of a primary reduction of portal blood flow. The hemodynamic effects of β‐blocking agents and vasodilatory drugs were noninvasively measured in eight patients with cirrhosis by means of pulsed echo‐doppler equipment.

Laurence F. McMahon – 1 November 1986 – The costs and benefits of liver transplantation in adult patients at the University of Pittsburgh were reviewed for the period from 1981 through 1984. Indirect costs such as those to support the surgical and hepatology programs, the operating rooms and the clinical pathology department were ignored, and only those costs generated by the liver transplant program were considered in this analysis. Benefits to the patients are survival itself.

R. Thomas Holzbach – 1 November 1986

Esteban Mezey, James J. Potter, Deborah L. Rhodes – 1 November 1986 – The effect of growth hormone on the activity of alcohol dehydrogenase was determined in hepatocyte culture from normal and hypophysectomized male rats. Alcohol dehydrogenase activity was highest in hepatocytes harvested from hypophysectomized rats. The enzyme activity remained stable in hepatocytes harvested from normal rats during 2 to 6 days of culture but declined steadily in hepatocytes cultured from hypophysectomized rats.