Preclinical evaluation of drugs for evidence of teratogenic activity

✍ Scribed by Harold M. Peck

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1963
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 498 KB
• Volume: 52
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0022-3549
• DOI: 10.1002/jps.2600521203

✦ Synopsis

If certain congenital malformations can be attributed in certain animals to dietary deficiency, anoxia, cortisone, or genetic constellations, one must not conclude without further proof that comparable malformations in man are due to similar adverse conditions. Such premature conclusions, usually not drawn by the experimentor but by a reader whose imagination and beliefs exceed his knowledge, can create superstitions in modern garb. If such a reader is also a writer with access to medical or popular journals, his unfounded beliefs are carried to millions, whereby new superstitions are established. . . . A single observation of an abnormal child born to a mother who had been in an automobile accident, becomes, i f reported in a popular magazine, psychologically, a hundred thousand observations which seem to establish a causal relationship between two events. The whispered word i s fiowerful, but the written word endures." Joseph Warkany, National Malformations, 1959 (1).

HE CIBA FOUNDATION SYMPOSIUM on Con-Tgenital

Malformations (2) and reviews by Wilson (3) and Giroud and Tuchmann-Duplesis (4) refer to many agents that have been shown to have teratogenic effects in animals. These vary from anticancer drugs to essential nutritional elements as shown by the following: TERATOGENIC AGENTS FOR ANIMALS Alkylating Compounds Nutritional Factors Chlorambuci 1 Deficiency Busulfan (human) Oxvgen RiGGflavin Agents Folic Acid Actinomycin D Vitamin A Cytotoxic or Antimitotic Pantothenic Acid Received from the Merck Institute for Therapeutic Re-Badd, in part, upon a presentation to the Scientific Section. search West Point Pa.