Contents - IADR/AADR

due to pulmonary stenosis and by pulmonary atresia by connecting a systemic artery to the pulmonary artery.
With the invention of the heart-lung bypass machine, heart surgery became commonplace, as did perforations of
the myocardium, valvular commissurotomy, plastic repair of diseased valves, replacement of old valves by
synthetic valves, correction of false communications in the heart, plastic repair of diseased coronary arteries,
excision of stenosed arteries and aneurysms and replacement with synthetic vessels. Heart replacement, first
successfully performed on Blaiberg, a dentist, in 1968, suffered a setback due to the misunderstood mechanisms
of tissue rejection. Renal transplants achieved after the use of immunosuppressive drugs fared better—some
1000 such patients survived for a considerable period of time.
Surgery also resorted to tracheotomy as an emergency measure; resection of the lung for tuberculosis,
bronchiectasis, or tumor; pacemakers for heart block inserted into the chest; colectomy for ulcerative colitis;
and portocaval shunt for cirrhosis of the liver. Vagotomy as recommended by Dragstedt 4 in 1943 became the
accepted treatment, with pyloroplasty, for duodenal ulcer. Corneal transplants achieved measurable success, as
did prostheses for hip fracture.
MEDICAL TREATMENT
The field of hematology was advanced by the discovery of the anticoagulants coumerin and heparin for
the prevention of thrombosis in coronary disease, cerebral insufficiency, and atrial fibrillation, as well as by the
important contribution of the Nobel Prize winners Murphy and Minot, 5 who demonstrated that liver extract
contains vitamin B-12, which is specific for pernicious anemia. In addition, the Rh blood factor was isolated in
the antiserum prepared by the injection of the blood of Rhesus monkeys into rabbits. Rh-negative mothers
immunized to Rh substance from an Rh-positive fetus led to the disease erythroblastosis fetalis. Replacement
transfusion was provided in therapy and RHO-GAM for prevention. Finally, Factors V-XII were unraveled in
the explanation of the clotting reaction. Factor VIII, the antihemophilic factor, present in blood plasma, was
found specific for hemophilia.
Psychiatry explained abnormal behavior more in relation to infantile and early childhood emotional
trauma than on the basis of the repressed sexual experience doctrine of Freud. Although the pathophysiology of
psychiatric disease has not been established, drug therapy has been effective in leading to discharge of large
numbers of patients confined to mental hospitals. Some of these drugs were the phenothiazine derivatives, such
as chlorpromazine, meprobamate, and chlordiazepoxide for anxiety; monamine oxidase inhibitors like
ipromasid and imipramine were for depression. The discovery of mescaline and lysergic acid diethylamide
(LSD) led to the field of experimental psychosis; their inappropriate use has been of social concern.
Diphenylhydantoin took its place as a dependent anticonvulsant drug, along with primidone, phenacemide, and
trimethadione. The new narcotic analgesic agents also found approval: meperidine, methadone, and
INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR DENTAL RESEARCH (IADR) – THE FIRST FIFTY YEAR HISTORY PAGE 11