Word: myasthenia
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
This arcane process of "auto-allergy" may be an important factor in many cases of anemia, in rheumatoid arthritis and myasthenia gravis, and in kidney and thyroid diseases. Last week, at the second of two Manhattan conferences on what many doctors prefer to call "autoimmune disease," researchers added impressive evidence on two recent additions to the catalogue of such ills: ulcerative colitis and pernicious anemia...
Clue in the Neck. Dr. Szent-Gyorgyi (pronounced St. Georgie) entered the cancer field almost by chance. After he fled Hungary's Communist control in 1947, he was able to resume at Woods Hole his long work on muscle. Concentrating on one of the commonest of muscular diseases, myasthenia gravis, he had a clue. Sometimes a victim of "MG" does better after his thymus gland is removed. Searching for the explanation, Szent-Gyorgyi, who has a Cambridge Ph.D. in biochemistry besides his M.D., spent years doing delicate chemical dissections of the thymus glands of calves, supplied by Chicago...
...Progress is being made in the treatment of myasthenia gravis, a baffling disease incapacitating about 100,000 Americans...
Rare & Grave. Despite Mrs. Lucas' enthusiasm, what had happened to Billy was really no miracle. He was a victim of myasthenia gravis, a mysterious, uncommon disease which usually strikes adolescents or the elderly. Infant cases are rare, and Billy's was especially hard for the doctors to diagnose because he was stricken so soon after birth, when cerebral palsy is the likeliest explanation of symptoms such...
Neostigmine (a muscle stimulant) is both a standard test and a standard treatment for myasthenia gravis. Perhaps because he was so young, Billy Lucas' response to the first injection was unusually dramatic. Now he is getting the drug in tablet form every three hours. But he has another chance for relief, now that the doctors know what ails him: his disease seems to be connected with the working of the thymus gland, and about half the victims of myasthenia gravis get better after removal of the thymus...