THE basic abnormality in myasthenia gravis is a decrease of acetylcholine receptors at neuromuscular junctions,^{1 2 3 4} which accounts for the impairment of neuromuscular transmission⁵ and results in the weakness and fatigability typical of the disorder. ...

AFTER being recognized as a distinct valvular syndrome in the classic work of Reid¹ and Barlow et al.,^{2 , 3} mitral-valve prolapse was first reported to be associated with bacterial endocarditis in 1964.⁴ Since that time, numerous case reports, case series,...

HOMOCYSTINURIA due to cystathionine beta–synthase deficiency is an inborn error of metabolism involving the trans-sulfuration of amino acids.^{1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9} Affected persons accumulate homocystine and methionine in their plasma and tissues and excrete ...

THE respiratory system consists essentially of two parts: a gas-exchanging organ — the lungs—and a pump that ventilates the lungs. The pump consists of the chest wall, the respiratory muscles that displace it, the centers in the nervous system that ...

ABOUT 15 million Americans have gallstones.¹ A majority of these gallstones are silent (painless).^{2 , 3} Should silent gallstones be treated prophylactically or left alone? The answer depends in part on their natural history. Whereas Sir William Osler ...

CHRONIC granulomatous disease of childhood is an inherited disease in which phagocytes lack the ability to use molecular oxygen to generate microbicidal oxygen byproducts (hydrogen peroxide, hydroxyl radical, or Superoxide anion). Classically recognized ...

COMMON variable immunodeficiency is characterized by different immunologic abnormalities responsible for agammaglobulinemia.¹ In this disease, impaired B-cell differentiation has been observed at different levels,² and defects of B-cell function in ...

Presentation of Case

A 66-year-old woman was admitted to the hospital because of facial swelling.

There was a six-year history of diabetes mellitus, which was regulated with daily injections of NPH insulin, 34 units. The patient performed no urine tests ...

Patient: So what's the verdict, doctor?

Physician: Well, Mrs. Gladstone, do you remember those x-rays we took because of your constipation?

Patient: But that's all cleared up now.

Physician: I'm very glad about that, and your bowel looks perfectly normal. ...

For centuries, the philosophies underlying medical and hospital care — its motivating beliefs and ideas—were simple: Care for whoever needs care, and worry later about who pays. For the past hundred years at least, with the advance of medical science and ...

To the Editor: Although observations that Δ⁹-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is secreted in the milk of lactating animals and that it passes to the suckling young have been made,^{1 2 3} no similar findings, to our knowledge, have been reported in human beings. ...

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

To the Editor: The question of possible sexual transmission of toxic-shock syndrome (TSS) was raised in a recent letter to the Journal.¹ We wish to report another potential route of TSS transmission—intravenous injection of illicit drugs. We recently ...

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

To the Editor: Moses et al.¹ describe in the April 22 issue a new familial abnormality of thyroid-hormone binding that appears to be different from familial euthyroid thyroxine excess. The latter condition^{2 3 4} has recently been called familial ...

To the Editor: In their recent letter in the February 18 issue, Morrow et al.¹ pointed out that nausea and vomiting before treatment are reasonably common in cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, and are largely refractory to standard antiemetic ...

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

To the Editor: The restriction of Medicaid funding of abortions for the poor by the federal government and most state governments in 1977 was accompanied by predictions that poor women would experience a decrease in the ratio of abortions to births (...

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

This book claims to document "drug dumping." By this is meant the practices of shameless advertising, failure to warn about drug hazards, and "shocking campaigns to induce poor countries to squander their few health-care rupees or pesos or shillings on ...

The initial chapters are general accounts of clinical support of acutely poisoned patients and the roles of the toxicology laboratory and of dialysis. The remainder of the book, Section 2, deals with the "management of common drug overdosages." The ...

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

Over the past half century two eminent medical mycologists (Conant and Emmons) did much to translate the terminology of general mycology into language understandable to clinicians and clinical microbiologists. Textbooks by these two giants (Conant's ...

The dust jacket describes this book as making "the scientific case against dieting as a means of weight control." When I began reading it I was puzzled. It was clearly not written for a scientific audience nor in a scientific style. Was it important to ...

Insufficient teaching of nutrition in medical school has recently become a focus of criticism by both nonphysicians and medical students, aided and abetted by some nutrition institutions and their officials. My experience and observations provide evidence ...

No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.

There are few subjects in all medicine more surrounded by controversy than that of venography of the lower extremity. Resolution will not be found in this book, a presentation of the author's personal views and experience.

Here will be found indications, ...

Basic Science

Acid–Base Physiology: A direct approach. By James L. Gamble, Jr. 125 pp. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982. $11.50.

Assessment of Immune Status by the Leukocyte Adherence Inhibition Test. Edited by D. M. P. Thomson. 380 pp. New ...

INFLAMMATORY BOWEL DISEASE

A program entitled "Inflammatory Bowel Disease Forum: An Update by the Experts" will be held at the Boston Marriott Hotel on Long Wharf on October 15 at 8:30 a.m. The fee is $75.

Contact the National Foundation for Ileitis and ...

The federal government's open-ended commitment to finance medical care for the nation's elderly population and eligible poor people has been reduced by wholesale reductions in spending that were incorporated in the $98.3-billion tax-increase bill ...