Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences
-
Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. · Dec 1993
Review Multicenter StudyRandomized trials in perinatology: major achievements and future potential.
-
Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. · Oct 1993
ReviewRole of CRF in stress-related alterations of gastric and colonic motor function.
Major advances have been made in the understanding of the pathophysiology of stress-related alteration of gut function. A wealth of information indicates that CRF is involved in the central mechanisms by which stress inhibits gastric emptying while stimulating colonic motor function. CRF acts in the PVN to trigger both the inhibition of gastric emptying and the stimulation of colonic motor function in response to stress, in addition to previously established endocrine and behavioral responses. ⋯ The central actions of CRF to alter gastric and colonic motor function are conveyed by autonomic pathways and are unrelated to the associated stimulation of pituitary hormone secretion. The demonstration that central CRF plays a role in mediating gastric stasis resulting from surgery, peritonitis or high levels of central interleukin-1 provides new insight into the mechanisms involved in gastric ileus induced postoperatively or by infectious disease. Likewise, the demonstration that CRF in the PVN and locus coeruleus induce the anxiogenic and colonic motor responses to stress and that colonic distention activates neurons in the locus coeruleus opens new avenues for the understanding of the pathogenesis of a subset of IBS patients with colonic hypersensitivity associated with psychopathological disturbance and diarrhea-predominant symptoms.
-
Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. · Sep 1993
ReviewNeural transplantation for neurodegenerative diseases: past, present, and future.
After almost 100 years of sporadic, and marginally successful, studies of neural transplantation in animals, we are now on the threshold of a clinical treatment of the damaged brain. The initial studies of neural transplantation have focused on Parkinson's disease, primarily as a model for a more general strategy of "repair by cellular replacement." Parkinson's is known to result from the loss of a small population of cells that produce the essential neuromodulator, dopamine, for much of the brain. Further, the disease is improved significantly, during the early part of its course, by chemical augmentation of dopamine activity through drug therapies, such as L-dopa. ⋯ This technique was applied to the collection and preservation of human tissue, and preliminary successful results have been obtained in patients with idiopathic Parkinson's disease. Others have reported success with different techniques in two MPTP-Parkinsonian patients and a small number of patients with idiopathic disease. If the most dramatic improvements can be replicated consistently and the benefits last for a reasonable period without complications, a clinical treatment might develop using "random-source" fetal cadaver cells.