Radiation diseases

B24. Burlakova, E. B., Dziuba, N. M., Palmina, N. P., and Emanuel, N. M., Antioxidative activity of lipids of mouse liver in radiation disease and reinoculation leucosis, and die effect of inhibitors of free-radical reactions. Dokl Akad. NaukSSSR 163, 1278—1281 (1965). 

Legeza VI, Galenko-Yaroshevskii VP, Zinov ev EV, Paramonov BA, Kreichman GS, Turkovskii II, Gumenyuk ES, Kamovich AG, Khripunov AK (2004) Bull Exp Biol Med 138 311 Effects of new wound dressings on healing of thermal burns of the skin in acute radiation disease... 

We decided to use two groups of children for the intrauterine study. The most important group would be those who were in the womb and within two thousand meters of the hypocenter at the moment of detonation, and whose mothers had developed the triad of radiation disease symptoms loss of hair, bleeding skin lesions, and throat and gum ulcerations. The other would be children who were in the womb at the moment of detonation but were four to five thousand meters from the hypocenter—a control group, as it were. 

Adapted from the 1958 "Report of the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effets of Atomic Radiation Diseases 1 10 account for 75% of the affected individuals represented in the table as a whole. It is apparent that the usually accepted figure of 1 % of liveborn individuals severely affected by simple dominant diseases may greatly overestimate the true impact of dominant mutation. To resolve the uncertainties, it will be more important in the future to obtain systematic family risk data for recognizable categories of disease, of known frequencies as represented in such a table, than to seek the patterns of inheritance for a finer diagnostic breakdown where the frequencies of conditions are not known. 

The proteolytic enzymes, trypsin, chymotrypsin, and chymoral [8076-22-0] in combination, have been used for the treatment of post-operative hand trauma, athletic injuries, and sciatica (214—216). Trypsin has also been used successfully in treating hyaline membrane disease of newborn babies, a condition usually fatal without treatment (217). Immobilized preparations of trypsin are useful in treating acute radiation cystitis following pelvic x-irradiation therapy (218). 

The other global environmental problem, stratospheric ozone depletion, was less controversial and more imminent. The U.S. Senate Committee Report supporting the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 states, Destruction of the ozone layer is caused primarily by the release into the atmosphere of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and similar manufactured substances—persistent chemicals that rise into the stratosphere where they catalyze the destruction of stratospheric ozone. A decrease in stratospheric ozone will allow more ultraviolet (UV) radiation to reach Earth, resulting in increased rates of disease in humans, including increased incidence of skin cancer, cataracts, and, potentially, suppression of the immune system. Increased UV radiation has also been shown to damage crops and marine resources."... 

Effects of indoor air pollutants on humans are essentially the same as those described in Chapter 7. However, there can be some additional pollutant exposures in the indoor environment that are not common in the ambient setting. From the listing in Table 23-1, radon exposures indoors present a radiation hazard for the development of lung cancer. Environmental tobacco smoke has been found to cause lung cancer and other respiratory diseases. Biological agents such as molds and other toxins may be a more likely exposure hazard indoors than outside. 

Toxic Effects on the Blood-Forming Tissues Reduced formation of erythrocytes and other elements of blood is an indication of damage to the bone marrow. Chemical compounds toxic to the bone marrow may cause pancytopenia, in which the levels of all elements of blood are reduced. Ionizing radiation, benzene, lindane, chlordane, arsenic, chloramphenicol, trinitrotoluene, gold salts, and phenylbutazone all induce pancytopenia. If the damage to the bone marrow is so severe that the production of blood elements is totally inhibited, the disease state is termed aplastic anemia. In the occupational environment, high concentrations of benzene can cause aplastic anemia. 

If the UV radiation were to reach the surface of the earth, it could have several adverse effects. A 5% decrease in ozone concentration could increase the incidence of skin cancer by 10% to 20%. Ultraviolet radiation is also a factor in diseases of the eye, including cataract formation. 

Cobalt-60 cancer therapy. Gamma rays from the rotating radiation source are concentrated at the location of the diseased tissue. 

Irene Curie and Frederic Joliot received the Nobel Prize in physics. The award came too late for Irene s mother, who had died of leukemia in 1934. Twenty-two years later. Irene Curie-Joliot died of the same disease. Both women acquired leukemia through prolonged exposure to radiation. 

Most recently, a phase-I-study defined a dose of 13-ris-retinoic acid that was tolerable in patients after myeloablative therapy, and a phase-III-trial showed that postconsolidation therapy with 13-cis-retinoic acid improved EFS for patients with high-risk neuroblastoma [7]. Preclinical studies in neuroblastoma indicate that ATRA or 13-cw-RA can antagonize cytotoxic chemotherapy and radiation, such that use of 13-cis-RA in neuroblastoma is limited to maintenance after completion of cytotoxic chemotherapy and radiation. It is likely that recurrent disease seen during or after 13-cis-RA therapy in neuroblastoma is due to tumor cell resistance to retinoid-mediated differentiation induction. Studies in neuroblastoma cell lines resistant to 13-cw-RA and ATRA have shown that they can be sensitive, and in some cases collaterally hypersensitive, to the cytotoxic retinoid fenretinide. Here, fenretinide induces tumor cell cytotoxicity rather than differentiation, acts independently from RA receptors, and in initial phase-I-trials has been well tolerated. Clinical trials of fenretinide, alone and in combination with ceramide modulators, are in development. 

Vaccinations containing live organisms are not administered within 3 months of immune globulin administration because antibodies in the globulin preparation may interfere with the immune response to the vaccination. Corticosteroids, antineoplastic dru, and radiation therapy depress the immune system to such a degree that insufficient numbers of antibodies are produced to prevent the disease. When the salicylates are administered with the varicella vaccination, there is an increased risk of Reye s syndrome developing. 

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