The New England journal of medicine
-
To determine the risks of reoperation and clinical recurrence in Crohn's disease involving the colon, we analyzed by both crude and actuarial (life-table) methods follow-up data from 160 patients hospitalized with Crohn's colitis or ileocolitis from 1964 through 1973. A total of 100 patients (63 per cent) underwent major operation; of these, 58 required reoperation. ⋯ By contrast, actuarial analysis revealed that at the three-year follow-up point, the cumulative chance of reoperation increased from 37 per cent after the first surgical procedure to 60 per cent after the fourth. The inexorable tendency of Crohn's ileocolitis to require repeated operations is demonstrable by actuarial methods.
-
Particulate fractions from normal human granulocytes preactivated with opsonized zymosan were found to catalyze superoxide production in the presence of reduced pyridine nucleotides. Similar preparations from three patients with X-linked chronic granulomatous disease produced no detectable superoxide. ⋯ Particles from the mothers of two of the patients produced superoxide at diminished rates; superoxide production by particles from the third mother was normal. These findings suggest that chronic granulomatous disease represents either a defect in a pyridine nucleotide-dependent superoxide-forming oxidase or a lesion in the apparatus responsible for activating the oxidase.