Search PubMed⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

A Nicholls

Publications and source records attributed to A Nicholls.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources
PubMed1978

An evaluation of the tuberculosis agglutination test.

The tuberculosis agglutination titre as described by Nicholls (1975) was measured without prior knowledge of the diagnosis in 27 patients with open pulmonary tuberculosis, 100 patients with other diseases and 14 control patients with no apparent disease. Reproducibility of the test, as judged by repeat estimations on split samples, was poor. When attempting to distinguish between the disease categories the test gave 29% false negatives in patients with tuberculosis and 52% false positives in patients with other disease. Therefore the tuberculosis agglutination titre cannot be recommended for use in distinguishing tuberculosis from other conditions.

Agglutination Tests↗
PubMed1977

Treatment of pulmonary aspergillosis with di-iodohydroxyquinoline.

Thirteen patients with a clinical diagnosis of pulmonary aspergillosis were treated with the anti-amoebic drug di-iodohydroxyquinoline, 1500-1800 mg/day orally, for 20 days. All were precipitin positive before treatment and all but one became negative after treatment. Sputum became negative in all of the 10 patients in whom it had been positive before treatment. Clinical improvement was marked in four patients, moderate in three, and slight in three, no change occurring in the remaining three. These results suggest that di-iodohydroxyquinoline may be of value in the treatment of pulmonary aspergillosis.

Adult↗
PubMed1975

Clinical and biochemical observations on three cases of hypoxanthine-guanine phosphoribosyltransferase deficiency.

Clinical and enzymatic studies on two brothers with severe deficiencies of erythrocyte hypoxanthineguanine phosphoribosyltransferase (HGPRTase) are described, and are compared with similar studies of a classical case of the Lesch-Nyhan syndrome from another family. The two brothers have no neurological abnormalities, only traces of erythrocyte HGPRTase, erythrocyte adenine phosphoribosyltransferase activities approaching the high levels found in the Lesch-Nyhan patient, and similarly raised plasma and urinary concentrations of uric acid. Despite these strong biochemical similarities between the three patients, there were wide differences in the clinical case histories. In both families the enzyme deficiency appeared to be inherited as an X-linked character through asymptomatic carrier females. The relationship of HGPRTase deficiencies to the Lesch-Nyhan syndrome is discussed. Some observations relating to techniques are reported. Cellulose acetate has been found to give much better separations of labelled reaction products in low-level phosphoribosyltransferase assays than filter paper, when used as a supporting medium for electrophoresis. The analysis of hair follicles gives indications of individuals heterozygous for the enzyme deficiency, but the proportion of enzyme-deficient follicles was very small, and the test needs support from studies of other cell types. Using haemolysates, there were signs of a slow indirect conversion of hypoxanthine to inosinic acid, via inosine. Inosine appears to be labelled by a ribosyl-transfer reaction.

Adenine Phosphoribosyltransferase↗
PubMed1973

Effect of oestrogen therapy on plasma and urinary levels of uric acid.

Uric acid clearance studies were carried out on a low-purine diet in 22 trans-sexual men before and during oestrogen therapy for this condition (stilboestrol in 21 cases, ethinyloestradiol in one). Plasma uric acid fell in 15 of the subjects and urinary uric acid rose in 17 of 20 subjects in whom satisfactory collections were obtained. These changes are significant and it is suggested that hormonal influences are responsible for the known age and sex differences in plasma uric acid.

Adult↗