Word: colon
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...many there were the partly decomposed bodies of insects, or "islands" of algae and fungi. Often, the walls were slimy. Most had a stale odor, and "a few were literally foul." When the bacteriologists went to work, they found that in 22% of the carafes the water contained colon bacilli, and no fewer than 69% held Staphylococcus aureus-including at least one of the deadly, penicillin-resistant strains that have caused wholesale epidemics and killed babies in some hospital nurseries (TIME, March...
...stay there, setting up an ever-present threat of infection and making the condition harder to detect since the barium used to get X-ray contrast may not penetrate the diverticulum sufficiently. In the symptom-free stage of diverticulosis there may be dozens of small diverticula scattered along the colon...
...Bend. Though the colon averages 5 ft. in length, the vast majority of diverticula are found in its last 15 inches, known as the sigmoid colon be cause it bends in an S shape from the lower end of the descending colon to the upper part of the rectum. Most of the sigmoid colon is in the left lower quarter of the body. When a diverticulum becomes inflamed (diverticulitis), the symptoms suggest "left-sided appendicitis." Symptoms usually include diarrhea, gas distension and pain...
...diagnostician's biggest concern is to distinguish an acutely inflamed diverticulum from cancer of the colon, and this was especially important in Dulles' case since he had had a 1¾-in. piece of cancerous tissue removed from the large bowel two years ago. The danger of recurrence was, of course, great. Fortunately, in most cases, X rays taken after a barium enema show a distinctive picture of one or the other. In Dulles' case there was a characteristic, unmistakable diverticulum...
Further to rule out the possibility of concurrent cancer, the diagnostician inserts a sigmoidoscope-a metal tube, 10 in. long, with a light at the end-through the rectum and examines the lower sigmoid colon visually. Now being refined are more elaborate techniques for washing out the colon, then flushing it with a solution to pick up stray cancer cells which can be identified on a Papanicolaou smear under the microscope...