Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: UMLS:C0023890 (cirrhosis)
 42,195 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Liver biopsies from 27 Bantu patients with primary carcinoma of the liver from Malawi were examined histologically. All the biopsies showed hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Structurally the tumours consisted of trabeculae or groups of such, separated by a variable amount of connective tissue which in a few cases was so pronounced that the tumour had a scirrhous character. Evaluation of the grade of differentiation showed 3 cases to be of grade I, 10 of grade II, 5 of grade III, and 8 of grade IV. The grade could bary in tumour tissue from the same patient, but never extremely so. The histological structure did not differ significantly from that found in other African and Caucasian series. The reticulin structure of tumour tissue was found distinctly different from that of benign tissue and thus an important tool in the differential diagnosis between HCC grade I and normal or cirrhotic liver tissue. Out of 15 patients 12 had cirrhosis which was of the postnecrotic type.
 ...
PMID:Primary carcinoma of the liver. A histological study of 27 cases of primary carcinoma of the liver from Malawi. 19 80

A consecutive series of 24 cases of primary carcinoma of the liver in Malawi has been investigated. Histologically, all were hepatocellular carcinomas (HCC). All patients were African Bantus, the average age was 42.7, and the sex ratio was men 3.5:women 1. The duration of symptoms attributable to HCC was about 5 months previous to admission to hospital and was in no case preceded by clinically manifest cirrhosis. The clinical picture was rather uniform with pain in the region of the liver, emaciation and nodular hepatomegaly as the most important features. One of the patients had repeated attacks of hypoglycaemic coma. Sera from 11 out of 13 patients contained alpha-feto-protein. Hepatitis-associated antigen and antibody in the serum were found in 7 and 6 out of 16 and 14 cases respectively. Serum B12 and serum unsaturated B12 binding capacity were moderately raised in most patients. The prognosis was poor, the average time of survival was 4.8 weeks after admission. The cause of death was most frequently hepatic coma. HCC in the African Bantu shows some different features from the same disease in the Western Hemisphere: The incidence is much higher; the patients are younger. The neoplasm commonly develops in a clinically latent cirrhosis. The latter is not caused by alcohol, but is presumably a sequel of hepatitis. It is possible that aflatoxin is the carcinogenic factor, acting more readily in a cirrhotic than in a normal liver.
 ...
PMID:Primary carcinoma of the liver in Malawi: a review of 24 cases. 19 21

Rare cases of hemochromatosis have been reported in patients who underwent prolonged oral iron therapy for hemolytic anemia or prolonged self-treatment with iron pills. A proportionately large segment of the South African Bantu tribe, who ingest large quantities of an alcoholic beverage brewed in iron pots, are found to have the disease. Reports of health fadists developing hemochromatosis due to excessive dietary iron intake, however, are extremely rare. This report presents clinical considerations and pathologic findings in a compulsive health fadist who consumed large numbers of vitamins containing iron. Clinical findings included the development and progression of cirrhosis of the liver, bronzing of the skin, and diabetes mellitus, all consistent with a diagnosis of hemochromatosis. Light microscopy of liver biopsies taken late in the course of the disease revealed a massive buildup of iron in the hepatocytes, less in the Kupffer cells, and sparse deposition in the epithelial cells of the bile duct. Minimal periportal fibrosis was noted. Electron microscopy showed numerous pleomorphic siderosomes with varying degrees of crystallization and ferritin attached at uniform intervals to the membranes of residual bodies. Abundant free ferritin was observed in most cells. The aggregated and membrane-associated ferritin was verified by non-dispersive x-ray analysis. An additional finding, noted only by electron microscopy, was the presence of many fat-storing cells of Ito, which are thought to be involved in the onset of fibrosis.
 ...
PMID:Hemochromatosis caused by excessive vitamin iron intake. 47 11

We report a case of a 40-year-old man of Bantu origin, affected by both HBV infection and primitive hepatocarcinoma in the absence of cirrhosis. The fine-needle aspiration specimen reported a rare variant of liver cancer resembling an adenocarcinoma. The neoplasm was certainly a hepatic primitive carcinoma, because chest X-ray, cranial computed tomography, colonoscopy, and abdominal computed tomography did not detect neoplastic lesions and alpha-fetoprotein was > 1000 ng/mL. The present neoplasm, characterized by severe portal hypertension and absence of cirrhosis, is rare in Italy, but largely diffused in Bantu people in Africa.
 ...
PMID:An unusual case, in Italy, of hepatocarcinoma characterized by portal hypertension and absence of cirrhosis. 1167 60