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Biomedical subjects

M J Swartz

Publications and source records attributed to M J Swartz.

7 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1997

Illness and morality in the Mombasa Swahili community: a metaphorical model in an Islamic culture.

The Swahili of Mombasa are Muslims, part of an ethnic group whose forebears founded East Africa's pre-colonial cities. Their cosmopolitan culture, in common with the cultures of some other, mainly Muslim, groups elsewhere includes a system of beliefs concerning the body's functioning and illness as the result of relations among the body's four humours. The Swahili version of this system and its use in curing is described and briefly compared to several others. Despite the availability of a variety of other systems, including the biomedical employed in the much patronized cost free treatment at government hospitals, the humoural system of beliefs is almost universally held. An hypothesis seeking to explain this suggests that because the Swahili schema is conceptualized by what Lakoff calls a "metaphorical model" emphasizing balance which is also used to conceptualize the values applying to key social relationships, the two schemata support one another, presumably by making the knowledge and emotions applying to one available in the other.

Adult↗
PubMed1977

Isolation and characterization of trypsin inhibitor from opaque-2 corn seeds.

Trypsin inhibitor was isolated from seeds of opaque-2 corn by affinity chromatography on a trypsin/Sepharose column. The two major forms of inhibitor eluted from the affinity column were separated by DEAE-cellulose chromatography in the presence of urea. One form of inhibitor is a single-chain protein that has a molecular weight of approximately 12,500; the second inhibitor has two polypeptide chains and appears to have been produced from the single-chain inhibitor by exposure to trypsin in the affinity chromatography step. The relationship of the inhibitor isolated from opaque-2 corn to an inhibitor previously isolated from an unspecified strain of maize by Hochstrasser et al. (Hochstrasser, K., Muss, M., and Werle, E. (1967) Z. Physiol. Chem. 348, 1337-1340) is discussed.

Chromatography, Affinity↗
PubMed1977

Management of hereditary site-specific colon cancer.

A family with site-specific colon cancer and discrete adenomatous colon polyps in certain members has provided a prototype for the study and clinical management of hereditary cancer. Analysis of this kindred showed an autosomal dominant mode of inheritance, early onset of cancer with predilection for the right colon, and frequent extraprimary cancers of the colon. Knowledge of these phenomena are critical to the management of this hereditary cancer syndrome. On our recommendation, two brothers of the family who were treated for colon cancer by hemicolectomy underwent prophylactic total colectomy. The resected colon from one of these patients had an occult adenocarcinoma in a villoglandular polyp.

Adult↗
PubMed1976

Survival data from a multiphasic mobile cancer detection unit.

Individuals with early cancer rarely have symptoms, through it is at this state that the best prognosis can be afforded. 22 out of 5,232-patients screened in a Mobile Cancer Detection Unit (MCDU) received cancer diagnosis (exclusive of skin cancer). These patients have enjoyed much greater survival than expected. For instance, only three have died versus and expected 7.5. Calculations show that if all cancer patients in the United States had a similar increase in survival, then the lives of at least 120,000-persons could be extended each year. These limited data must be interpreted cautiously. Nevertheless, they do hold promise since only a few percentage points increase in survival when measured against the full impact of the cancer problem will show significant patient benefit.

Adolescent↗