Tissue bank expands facilities, efforts

Article Abstract:

A description is presented of the activities of the Tissue Bank of The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. Formerly called the Skin Bank, this facility now collects skin, bone, heart valves, and veins. It collects about one-fourth of all skin used to treat burn patients and plans to expand its heart valve collection efforts. The tissue bank plans to move to new quarters near two renowned burn units that use approximately two-thirds of the skin donated each year to the bank. The rest is sent throughout the country to burn treatment centers. Donated skin is used initially to protect burned skin from infection and fluid loss; later, it is placed over grafts of the patient's own skin to help the grafts ''take''. The technicians at the tissue bank are highly skilled and provide physicians with a high-quality product. They harvest skin from several sites on cadavers, including the back, where skin is harder and tougher than in many other areas. For grafting, skin layers are the thickness of skin that peels from a sunburn. Each donor contributes approximately 5 square feet of skin, and as much as 15 square feet are used to cover a large severely burned child in one procedure. Skin does not need to be typed, since burn victims can not reject it due to their poorly functioning immune systems. Cells are removed from bone before it is used, preventing immunologic rejection. Uses for donated bone include orthopedic surgery as well as prevention and correction of disfiguring defects. Donors and their families are treated with dignity, respect, and gratitude for their lifesaving gifts. Public education campaigns try to tell people how they can help. Tissues, unlike organs, can be harvested many hours after death and can be stored for long periods of time. Thus, more people can donate tissues than organs. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.)

Texas, Tissue banks

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Museum scholars to apply holocaust experience to 1990s biomedical issues

Article Abstract:

One of the displays at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington DC will focus on the physicians of the Third Reich in Germany during World War II. The museum is scheduled to open in Apr 1993, and will be dedicated to the study and teaching of issues related to the Holocaust, to prevent its recurrence. During the Holocaust that occurred in Nazi Germany between 1939 and 1945, millions of people, including six million Jews were persecuted and killed by the Nazis. Twenty-three German physicians were tried at Nuremberg for using Holocaust victims in medical experiments and for other crimes. Many other German physicians did not do anything to prevent these crimes. An advisory committee investigated the affect of the Nazi regime on daily medical practice by German physicians and other health professionals. Crimes committed by German physicians will also be compared to those committed by US physicians and medical researchers in the past.

Planning, Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945), Museums, Art museums, Medical ethics, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

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Cancer cells' immortality may prove their undoing

Article Abstract:

The enzyme telomerase may allow cancer cells to divide endlessly. Research presented at the American Cancer Society's 37th Science Writers Seminar suggests that telomerase stabilizes the chromosomes in cancer cells during cellular division. This prevents the cancer cells from aging and allows them to replicate indefinitely. Researchers identified telomerase activity in approximately 85% of the cancers they examined. Telomerase activity was not observed in 72 noncancerous body cell cultures and tissue samples. Advanced cancers tended to have greater telomerase activity than early-stage cancers. The development of anticancer agents that inhibit telomerase activity may be highly effective, specific for cancer cells, and may produce few adverse effects. Researchers are studying several anticancer agents and may begin clinical trials between 1997 and the year 2000.

Antineoplastic agents, Cancer cells, Cell division

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