Gastrointestinal Transit Time in Ovarian Carcinoma Irradiated with60Co

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

The introduction of high energy radiation has made it possible to deliver larger radiation doses to the abdominal viscera.Reaction of the skin previously often limited the dose, while nowadays that of the gastrointestinal tract is one of the main dose-limiting factors.Ionizing radiation may impair intestinal peristalsis.CONARD ( 195 1 ) demonstrated disturbances of peristalsis of the small intestine a few minutes after whole body irradiation in the rat.He also reported (1956) that the minimum dose necessary to affect peristalsis varied with the species and that animal experiments would therefore not permit any conclusions about the minimum dose producing such alterations in man.Only few reports have been published on disturbances of emptying of the stomach and of propulsion in the small intestine following irradiation of the abdomen.KORNEEVA (1963) was of the opinion that such treatment accelerated emptying of the stomach.WALLACE ( 1941 ) investigated the propulsion in the small intestine in 10 patients before and at the end of irradiation of the lower part of the abdomen with 200 or 400 kV for carcinoma of the uterine cervix; in 7 of these the motility was diminished.