Biomedical subjects

C Hetu

Publications and source records attributed to C Hetu.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed1994

Shoplifting and mental illness.

A survey of 1,649 shoplifting convictions at a Montreal area municipal court found that a relatively low percentage (3.2%) of the cases involved mentally ill patients and that there is a comparatively closer link between shoplifting and affective disorders, alcoholism and drug addiction. The survey also showed that shoplifting is related more to mental illness than to the use of psychotropic drugs. The authors therefore reject the hypothesis of pharmacogenic shoplifting which has been reported in some studies on small numbers of shoplifters.

Adult↗

PubMed1982

Inhibition of liver regeneration by chronic alcohol administration.

Liver regeneration is the common mechanism whereby a patient recovers form a liver injury. In the western world, ethanol is the single most important aetiological factor associated with liver disease, and it appears crucial to determine if ethanol interferes with liver regeneration. We studied the response to a 70% hepatectomy in 240 rats receiving a nutritionally adequate diet containing 36% of their calories as ethanol for three weeks and their pair-fed controls receiving a liquid diet where ethanol is isocalorically replace with carbohydrates. Criteria of liver regeneration were: incorporation of 3H-thymidine in hepatocyte DNA (cpm/10 microgram DNA) and number of hepatocyte labelled nuclei on autoradiography per 100 high power fields. Controls displayed the usual response with peak activity of liver regeneration at 24 hours. Consumption of ethanol was associated with a statistically significant reduction of liver regeneration by both criteria for up to 72 hours after a 70% hepatectomy and delayed the peak of regenerative activity by 24 hours. This inhibiting effect was not related to the presence of alcohol in blood nor to hepatic microsomal enzyme induction by ethanol nor to widespread necrosis of hepatocytes. This effect was reversible after one week of abstinence. This impairment of liver cell renewal by ethanol may be of major significance in the severity and outcome of alcohol-related liver injury.

Animals↗

PubMed1980

Ethanol-inducible liver cytochrome P-450 in the rat: relative specificity for ethanol oxidation activity in vitro.

Ethanol induces in rat liver microsomes a form of cytochrome P-450 differing in substrate specificity from cytochrome P-450 species present in controls or in rats treated with phenobarbital or 3-methylcholanthrene. Its relative capacity to oxidize ethanol remained to be determined and was studied using highly purified cytochrome P-450 preparations and comparing their activity in a reconstituted microsomal ethanol oxidizing system (MEOS). On a molar basis, reconstituted MEOS activity was found to be highest when assayed with ethanol-inducible cytochrome P-450, intermediate with cytochrome P-450 from phenobarbital-treated rats, and lowest with cytochrome P-450 from controls or 3-methylcholanthrene-treated rats. A decrease in apparent Km for ethanol was also found to be associated with higher MEOS activity of ethanol-inducible cytochrome P-450. The induction by ethanol of a catalytically distinct form of cytochrome P-450, and the comparatively high ethanol oxidizing activity of this cytochrome P-450 species, are in accordance with the MEOS hypothesis.

Acetaldehyde↗