Management of huge epiphrenic esophageal diverticula.

Epiphrenic diverticula occur in association with motor disorders of the distal esophagus, including achalasia and diffuse esophageal spasm. Four patients with huge symptomatic epiphrenic diverticula are presented to emphasize the need for complete radiographic and manometric studies of the esophagus to document this motor dysfunction prior to performing combined diverticulectomy and esophagomyotomy. Each patient had achalasia with symptoms extending from 4 to 25 years.

Endoscopic biopsy can detect high-grade dysplasia or early adenocarcinoma in Barrett's esophagus without grossly recognizable neoplastic lesions.

There is uncertainty regarding the value of endoscopic biopsy surveillance in Barrett's esophagus because, in retrospective studies, some patients with high-grade dysplasia in endoscopic biopsy specimens have had unexpected advanced adenocarcinoma discovered at the time of esophageal resection. We compared the accuracy of preoperative endoscopic biopsy diagnoses with the final pathologic diagnoses in esophagectomy specimens in 4 patients who had both high-grade dysplasia and intramucosal carcinoma and 4 other patients who had only high-grade dysplasia preoperatively. The histologic lesions in all 8 patients were documented in intact mucosa with no gross evidence of neoplasia by endoscopy.

Cryolumpectomy for carcinoma of the breast.

Cryosurgery and surgical en bloc excision in preventing the local recurrence of mammary adenocarcinoma were studied in BALB/cfC3H (supplied by the Cancer Research Institute, University of California Berkeley) syngeneic mice carrying virus induced mammary adenocarcinomas transplanted into the fourth mammary fat pad. Cryosurgical procedures involving multiple freeze-thaw cycles to minus 180 degrees C. followed by tumor excision substantially reduced the local recurrence rate of carcinoma of the mammary gland in the mouse.

Risk factors for gallbladder perforation.

Perforation of the gallbladder is a potentially lethal problem due in part to a delay in diagnosis. In an effort to improve our management of these patients, we reviewed all patients seen at the UCLA affiliated hospitals between 1955 and 1983 who had perforation of the gallbladder. Fifty-one patients were reviewed and perforations categorized as either acute (type I) in 16 (31%), subacute (type II) in 20 (39%), or chronic (type III) in 15 (29%).

Altered gallbladder concentration of biliary lipids during early cholesterol gallstone formation.

Whether gallbladder absorptive function is altered during formation of cholesterol gallstones is unclear. We tested the hypothesis that alterations in biliary lipid composition present during early cholesterol gallstone formation enhance gallbladder absorption, as manifested by an increase in the ratio of gallbladder to hepatic bile lipid concentrations. Prairie dogs received either control or a 0.