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Biomedical subjects

E Watkins

Publications and source records attributed to E Watkins.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources
PubMed1983

Segmental pancreatic autotransplantation for chronic pancreatitis. A preliminary report.

A patient who underwent 95% pancreatectomy with autotransplantation of the body and tail of the gland to the femoral area for chronic pancreatitis is presented. The pain resolved, and the patient's blood glucose level remained within normal limits. High levels of insulin were found in the iliac vein on the transplanted side. Patency of the graft was demonstrated by technetium scan and arteriography and followed by a color-coded Doppler imaging system. Segmental pancreatic autotransplantation offers a method of relieving pain with preservation of endocrine function in selected patients with chronic pancreatitis.

Blood Glucose↗
PubMed1982

Surgical and urologic manpower in the United States, 1969 to 1978.

Between 1969 and 1978 the number of board-certified urologists increased by 71 per cent, while the population of the United States increased by 8.2 per cent. In 1978 the ratio of board-certified urologists to population was 1:32,416 and 326 of 370 first-year residency positions available in urology in the United States were filled. If we continue to produce urologists at the present rate the urologist to population ratio will be approximately 1:25,972 by year 2000. Thus, it appears that there are now too many urologists being trained yearly, which was indicated by 68 per cent of the academic program directors surveyed in 1979. In fact, to restore the ratio of urologist to population approximately 1:35,000 by year 2000 the number of urologists being trained yearly should be reduced to 156 or by approximately 50 per cent. The only reasonable chance of achieving a reduction in urologists being trained in the near future is by voluntary decreases in the size of training programs. There are many consequences of overproduction of urologists, including unnecessary surgery, atrophy of skills among practitioners and diminution of major training programs because of lack of patient referrals. Therefore, this issue is of equal importance to private practitioners and to academicians.

General Surgery↗
PubMed1976

Prevention of vascular complications of diabetes by pancreatic islet transplantation.

Isolated pancreatic islets from Wistar-Lewis rats were transplanted into the liver of diabetic allogeneic recipients to assess ability to prevent diabetic renal and ophthalmic complications. At nine months, the diabetic animals without transplants showed significant increase in PAS-positive material in the renal glomerular mesangium and thickening of glomerular arterioles as compared with normal nondiabetic animals. New vessel formation was also significant in the retina and retinal capillary dilation. Animals in which diabetes had been corrected by early pancreatic islet transplantation were completely protected from these changes, showing no significant pathologic change when compared with normal animals.

Animals↗
PubMed1976

Isolated islet transplantation in experimental diabetes.

Pancreatic islets have been isolated from the exocrine pancreas of inbred rats by the collagenase digestion method. Transplantation of isolated islets into the portal venous system of streptozotocin diabetic recipients resulted in complete abrogation of the diabetic state as measured by non-fasting serum glucose level, 24 h urinary output, rate of weight gain and glucose tolerance test. Transplantation to other sites resulted in less than optimal survival and function of islets. Allogeneic islets, transplanted across weak histocompatibility barriers, can survive and function for prolonged periods of time when transplanted recipients are immunosuppressed with antilymphocyte serum (ALS). Recipients of allogeneic islets, after a period of immunosuppression with ALS, become permanently tolerant to the allografted islets and to subsequent skin grafts from similar allogeneic donors. Allografted islets are able to prevent the occurrence of diabetic renal and ophthalmic changes that occur in control diabetic animals which had not undergone transplantation.

Animals↗
PubMed1976

Sialoproteinaemia: lack of correlation with inhibition of in vitro lymphoblastosis induced by phytohaemagglutinin or alloantigen.

Elevation of serum-bound sialic acid concentration in different disease states fails to correlate significantly with suppressive serum actions in mixed allogeneic lymphocyte cultures or phyto-haemagglutinin cultures. Heat-decomplemented serum from patients with abnormal levels of bound sialic acid was added to parallel cultures containing similar blood lymphocyte populations derived from normal humans. Wide fluctuations of the rate of incorporation of tritiated thymidine into nucleoprotein indicated presence of suppressive elements other than sialoprotein in the added serum components. Serum with rising sialyl concentration derived from patients with cancer showed slight tendency to augment mixed lymphocyte and phytohaemagglutinin responses. The findings suggest that the previously documented nonspecific suppressive action of serum sialoprotein on human host lymphoblastic response to neuraminidase-treated cancer cells represents a mechanism unique to that culture system rather than a manifestation of a general immunoregulatory function of serum sialoprotein.

Blood Protein Disorders↗
PubMed1975

Immunologic approach to cancer therapy.

The resistance that many cancer patients show to the progress of their disease, attested to by well documented cases of spontaneous regressions as in neuroblastoma, hypernephroma, choriocarcinoma and malignant melanoma, and the long-term dormancy of multiple metastases seen particularly after removal of a primary mass, can be explained only by host defense mechanisms. Attemps at immunotherapy over the years are reviewed and new directions are presented.

Animals↗
PubMed1974

Neuraminidase-mediated augmentation of in vitro immune response of patients with solid tumors.

Host blood lymphocytes undergo accentuated blastic transformation when cultured with tumor cells pretreated with neuraminidase. The effect has been observed in 38 patients with such common solid tumors as bronchus carcinoma, skin melanoma, hypernephroma, or adenocarcinoma of the breast, lung, colon, or rectum. Individual response varied but often exceeded response to allogeneic cells. Three patients with glioblastoma of the brain did not respond. Lymphoblastic transformation was not observed in three of four cultures containing benign tumor or in any cultures containing normal tissue analogues of the malignant tumors. A factor in host blood serum inhibiting lymphoblastic transformation correlated to abnormal elevation of serum-bound sialic acid. This blocking factor differed in specificity from enhancing antibody or serum blocking complexes described by other investigators. Blocking effects were observed when the tumor-cell type of a serum donor differed from the cell type of the culture test tumor. Serum with abnormal elevation of bound sialate from a cancerfree human also non-specifically blocked host response to tumor. The blocking effect could be eliminated by partial enzymatic removal of bound sialic acid from serum glycoproteins.

Adenocarcinoma↗