Katriina Nikkilä, Krister Höckerstedt, Tatu A. Miettinen – 1 May 1992 – Serum noncholesterol sterols indicate overall cholesterol metabolism in a variety of experimental and clinical conditions. In patients with advanced primary biliary cirrhosis serum cholestanol, a 5ä‐derivative of cholesterol, is markedly increased, and cholesterol precursors, which are indicators of cholesterol synthesis, are clearly reduced, as is the ratio of plant sterols (campesterol/sitosterol).

Jean‐François Dufour, Christopher Stoupis, François Lazeyras, Peter Vock, François Terrier, Jürg Reichen – 1 May 1992 – Quantitative liver function tests are based on the clearance concept and measure the plasma disappearance of a test compound such as galactose. Metabolism is inferred to be predominantly hepatic, and usually no knowledge is obtained of the true time course of metabolite formation. Dynamic 31phosphorus magnetic resonance spectroscopy after intravenous administration of fructose directly measures hepatic sugar metabolism.

Chia‐Ming Chu, King‐Wah Chiu, Yun‐Fan Liaw – 1 May 1992 – The prevalence and prognostic significance of spontaneous bacterial peritonitis were prospectively studied in a series of 82 acute hepatitis patients decompensated with ascites. The in‐hospital prevalence of spontaneous bacterial peritonitis was 31.7% (26 of 82 patients). Twenty cases were culture positive, including one with multiple isolates, and six cases were culture negative. E.

Akira Eguchi, Osamu Nakashima, Sadayuki Okudaira, Shigetaka Sugihara, Masamichi Kojiro – 1 May 1992 – The nodular lesions seen in the noncancerous areas of the 80 consecutively resected small hepatocellular carcinoma associated with cirrhosis were pathomorphologically studied. A total of 51 nodular lesions were found, and they were classified into the following four groups: large regenerative nodule (30 nodules), adenomatous hyperplasia (12 nodules), atypical adenomatous hyperplasia (4 nodules) and adenomatous hyperplasia containing cancerous foci (5 nodules).

Eldon A. Shaffer – 1 April 1992 – A 45‐minute infusion of an octapeptide of cholecystokinin (Kinevac; Squibb Diagnostics, New Brunswick, NJ) was used to measure the gallbladder ejection fraction during cholescintigraphy in 40 normal volunteers. Cholecystokinin cholescintigraphy was shown to be a reproducible test. The maximum mean gallbladder ejection fraction occurred 15 minutes after cholecystokinin infusion and was 74.5% ± 1.9% (mean ± SEM). A gallbladder ejection fraction >40% (mean – 3SD) was arbitrarily defined to be normal.

Michael A. Gerber – 1 April 1992

Antonio M. Lacy, Miguel Navasa, Rosa Gilabert, Concepción Brü, Juan C. García‐Pagán, Juan C. García‐Valdecasas, Luis Grande, Fausto Feu, José Fuster, José Terés, José Visa, Jaime Bosch – 1 April 1992 – We studied 23 patients with cirrhosis who had undergone retroperitoneal distal splenorenal shunt without portal‐azygos disconnection more than 2 yr earlier.

Helmut K. Wolf, George K. Michalopoulos – 1 April 1992 – It has been suggested that in fulminant hepatitis it is the lack of hepatocyte regeneration that in the presence of an ongoing loss of hepatocytes leads to hepatic failure and ultimately determines the grim prognosis of this disease. However, little data are available concerning hepatocyte regeneration in human acute hepatitis.

Sadataka Inuzuka, Takato Ueno, Takuji Torimura, Seishu Tamaki, Ryuichiro Sakata, Michio Sata, Hiroshi Yoshida, Kyuichi Tanikawa – 1 April 1992 – The concentration of plasma vitronectin was determined and compared with various parameters of liver function including the blood coagulation system in patients with liver diseases. The severity of cirrhosis was graded according to Child's criteria and compared with the plasma vitronectin level.

Nancy Bach, Swan N. Thung, Fenton Schaffner – 1 April 1992 – Before the availability of serological markers for hepatitis C, the morphological features of this diagnosis, which represents most non‐A, non‐B hepatitis, could not be confirmed. We examined biopsy specimens from 50 patients with chronic hepatitis C and 21 patients with autoimmune chronic hepatitis. Each biopsy specimen was graded on 19 different histological features. The results indicated that at the time of biopsy, the average age of patients with chronic hepatitis C was 46 yr vs. 36 yr for autoimmune chronic hepatitis.