The cholesterol tolerance test in normal individuals.

and leg. A third son,aged 29, had numerouslesions offace and ears, with a duration possibly of 16 years. Twoother sons were notaffected: the grandfather probablywas affected. It was found that the lesions were muchless radiosensitive than might be expected from theirhistological nature.B. Lennox. MyConception of Cellular Nevi. MASSON, P. (1951).Calcer, 4, 9. This outline of the neurogenic hypothesis of theorigin of pigmented naevi by itsoriginator is clear andtimely. Theorigin of naevi is said tobe twofold, fromepidermal melanoblasts which multiply and spreadinto the dermis, aind from the Schwann cells of thecutaneous nerves which multiply and infiltrate the deeperdermis. These twocomponents merge and becomeindistinguishable from each other. The epidermalmelanoblasts arespecific cells, distinct from the restof the epidermal cells; their precise sourcedevelop-mentally is still debatable, possibly from the neural crest,possibly from the epidermis itself. In apigmentednaevus which has become malignant it is very difficulttodetermine histologically whether both of the twocomponents of the naevusmay have been the sourceofthe growth. While there is no doubt that malignantchange often involves the epidermal melanoblasts, twospecimens lead the author to believe that the neuroid"elements could have been the sourceof the growths.R. A. Willis. Frequency and Form of Primary Cancer of the Liver.ZEITLHOFER, J. (1951). Krebsarzt, 6, 154. In this paper is reported astudy of the incidence ofprimary cancer of the liver based upon the post-mortemrecords of the Pathological Anatomical Institute inVienna. The work was undertaken to investigate whetherthe use of " butter yellow" has affected the incidenceof this disease. The investigation covered three periods:1900-12, when no butter yellow was in use;192C-32,when it was used to someextent; and 1938-50, whenit was used to a much greater extent. From ananalysisof the figures it appears that there has not been anyactual increase in primary liver cancerduring the half-century, but that the diffuse form of the disease hastended to increase and the nodular form todecrease.When the incidence of cirrhosis of the liver wasinvesti-gated, there was found tobe asignificant increase overthe sameperiod. [Similar figures for large series of cases arerequired to exclude the errors which areinevitable when dealing with small numbers in a disease ofsuch rarity.]H. Russell (Excerpta Medica). Primary Carcinoma of the Liver in Hemochromatosis.WARREN, S., and DRAKE, W. L. ( 1 95 1). Amer. J. Path.,27, 573. The incidence of hepatic carcinoma in various reportedseries of post-mortem examinations in cases of haemo-chromatosis ranges between 110% and 43%. In apersonalseries of 20 cases 6 cases of carcinoma of the liver werefound anincidence of 30%. Combining the authors'figures with those of earlier reports, among 127 cases ofhaemochromatosis there were 24 of hepatic carcinoma-anincidence of 18.9%. The average age of the patientsinthe authors' casesof uncomplicated haemochromatosiswas 56.3 years, and of those withcarcinoma 65.5 years.Carcinoma occurred in some cases with only mild cir-rhosis, and cannot be attributed solely to excessiveregenerative hyperplasia resulting from cirrhosis. Thefrequent development of carcinoma in haemochromatosis" is doubtless linked to the cause or causes" of thisdisorder, which "provides a settingfor carcinogenesismoreeffective than simple portalcirrhosis."R. A. Willis. Glycogen Storage Disease. I.Familial Cardiac GlycogenStorage Disease: Report of Two Cases and Discussionof Relation to Other Formsof Abnormal GlycogenDeposition. LANDING, B. H., and BANGLE, R. (1950).Bull. int. Ass. med. Mus., 31, 84. Bibliography. The clinical features and necropsy and histologicalfindings are described in 2cases of cardiac glycogen-storage disease occurring in brothers who died aged 43months and 24 months repectively. Necropsy wasperformed 5 and 8 hours after death respectively andthe chief finding was gross cardiac enlargement. Theheart weights were 67 g. (normal 27 g.) and 88.5 g.(normal 23 g.). Theductus arteriosus was closed andthere was a patent, slit-like foramen ovale in both cases.Histologically, the heart muscle fibres contained largecentral " vacuoles " surrounded by afringe of myofibrils.The "vacuoles" failed to take fat stains, but werecoloured by Best's carmine and periodic acid-leuko-fuchsin stains.On searching the literature the authors found 35 casesof thedisease reported, of which 31 are summarized intabular form. The condition appears to occur in twowell-defined age groups, namely, in infancy and duringadolescence, and, like many other metabolic disorders, isthe more severe and rapidly progressive, the youngerthe patient. From the literature available the authorsconclude that cardiac glycogen-storage disease differsfrom the hepatic form in that theformer may be a sex-linked condition, whereas the latter probably is not.The available evidence is inconclusive as to whether thedisease isinherited as a Mendelial dominant or recessivecharacter. No case embodying both cardiac and hepaticglycogen storage has sofar been described.Single and multiple rhabdomyomatosis is probablycommoner than cardiac glycogen-storage disease, thehistology of the twodiseases is different, and the formercondition tends to be associated with tuberous sclerosis." Diffuse cardiac rhabdomyomatosis" in all proba-bility does not exist as a definite disease entity.