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W. L. NASTUK, PhD; H. J. KESSLER, DDS; A. GRYNBAUM, ba; M. SMITH, MD; C. HERRMANN, JR.

Arch Neurol. 1966;15(1):1-12.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

Patients with myasthenia gravis show evidence of unusual immunological activity. Nastuk et al¹⁴ demonstrated that in such patients serum complement (C') activity frequently lies outside the extremes of the normal range. From these findings and from consideration of other factors, they proposed the hypothesis that myasthenia GRAVIS is a disease in which autoimmune mechanisms play an important role. Strong support for this hypothesis was provided at the same time by Strauss et al²¹ who demonstrated the presence of muscle binding, complement-fixing serum globulin in the serum of certain patients with myasthenia gravis. Simultaneously and independently, Simpson¹⁷ proposed that myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune disease. Simpson reached his position from a reevaluation of clinical and pathological evidence. Since these beginnings, many immunological aspects of myasthenia gravis have been reported in more recent publications.^{1,4,6-8,10,11,15,19}

Well before any immunologic function of the thymus gland was demonstrated, thymectomy was performed . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
NEW YORK; LOS ANGELES

From the Department of Physiology, Columbia University, New York. Dr. Herrmann's address is the Division of Neurology, University of California, Los Angeles.

Footnotes
Submitted for publication Dec 4, 1965; accepted March 5, 1966.

Reprint requests to Department of Physiology, College of Physicians and Surgeons, 630 W 168th St, New York 10032 (Dr. Nastuk).

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