Lower gastrointestinal endoultrasound
SummaryFollowing a brief history of transrectal ultrasonography, the author explains the fundamentals that led to his research on rectal echographic layers and then describes his theory as applied to the anatomical interpretation of these layers. Personal cases of preoperative staging with transrectal echography provide a basis for the critical evaluation of this method and its proposed role in clinical application.
Endoluminal ultrasonic scanning in the evaluation of rectal cancer: A preliminary report of 13 cases
In 13 patients with a verified tumor of the rectum, endoluminal ultrasonic scanning was performed to evaluate the degree of tumor infiltration in the muscular wall and the perirectal tissue. In 11 cases the degree of tumor infiltration found by ultrasonic scanning was in complete accordance with the histopathologic finding. In 2 cases the examination was incomplete because the ultrasonic probe could not pass the tumor. We believe that endoluminal ultrasonic scanning with further development of the equipment will be a valuable additional diagnostic tool in the evaluation of gastrointestinal tract tumors. It will make it possible to decide whether local excision of the tumor is possible, based on the diagnostic procedure.
Do Potential People Have Moral Rights?
By a potential person I shall mean an entity which is not now a person but which is capable of developing into a person, given certain biologically and/or technologically possible conditions. This is admittedly a narrower sense than some would attach to the term ‘potential'. After all, people of the twenty-fifth century, if such there will be, are in some sense potential people now, even though the specific biological entities from which they will develop, i.e. the particular gametes or concepti, do not yet exist. For there do exist, in the reproductive capacities of people now living and in the earth's resources, conditions adequate to produce these future people eventually, provided of course that various possible catastrophes are avoided. Indeed, in some sense of ‘potential’ there have been countless billions of potential people from the beginning of time. But I am concerned not with such remote potentialities but with currently existing entities that are capable of developing into people.