[Expected Duties of Pharmacists and Potential Needs of Physicians and Nurses on a Kaifukuki Rehabilitation Ward].

This study investigated the required duties of pharmacists in a kaifukuki rehabilitation ward from the viewpoint of the ward physicians and nurses. A questionnaire survey was distributed to 27 facilities with kaifukuki rehabilitation wards. The questionnaire examined which duties the physicians and nurses expected from pharmacists while on the ward (4 areas, 10 items), as well as the time required for pharmacists to carry out those duties.

Microscopic liver metastasis: prognostic factor for patients with pT2 gallbladder carcinoma.

Hepatic metastasis is the most frequent mode of recurrence of advanced gallbladder cancer after radical resection. The aims of this study were to clarify the clinical significance of microscopic liver metastasis from pT2 gallbladder cancer and to clarify whether partial hepatectomy can prevent hepatic recurrence in patients with microscopic liver metastasis. The subjects included 20 patients with pT2 tumors who underwent radical surgery and partial hepatectomy with lymph node dissection.

Clinicohistological features of liver failure after excessive hepatectomy.

Background/aims: Patients at high risk of liver failure sometimes suffer such failure with hyperbilirubinemia after hepatectomy. This report clarifies the clinicohistological findings in liver failure cases after excessive hepatectomy, and discusses the mechanisms of liver failure.

Methodology: Of 16 patients who suffered liver failure after hepatectomy between May 1992 and December 1999, 7 patients who underwent liver biopsy or autopsy were studied.

Localization of ladsin, a homolog of laminin-5, in normal adult human tissues: immunohistochemical and immunoelectron microscopic studies.

Ladsin, a homolog of laminin-5, is a large cell-adhesive protein with potent cell-scattering activity. In the present study, we investigated, by immunohistochemistry, the distribution of ladsin in a wide range of normal adult human epithelial tissues along with that of integrin subunit alpha3 as a marker of integrin alpha3beta1, which is the primary receptor of ladsin. Our results demonstrated that ladsin was localized in the basement membranes of almost all the epithelial tissues with coexisting integrin subunit alpha3 along the cell membranes, suggesting that their interaction is important in the maintenance of normal architecture and function of these membranes.