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Three treatment regimens were tried in 145 portal hypertensives with bleeding oesophageal varices to test the efficacy of each regimen in the prevention of rebleeding. Forty-seven cases received oral propranolol, 57 sclerotherapy, while 41 who did not receive any treatment except conservative management served as controls. Patients were followed up at 6 weeks, 6 months, 1 and 2 years to see the frequency of bleeding with each regimen. No significant difference was seen at 6 weeks with either of the three regimens but at 6 months and 1 year the frequency of bleeding was significantly less (p less than 0.05) in the propranolol group than in the other two groups while at 2 years results were significantly better with both propranolol (p less than 0.05) and sclerotherapy (p less than 0.001) than in controls. Efficacy of propranolol when compared with sclerotherapy showed similar results. The results of the present study are different from most of the western reports where sclerotherapy was found to be superior to propranolol. Variations in the results are likely to be due to differences in the etiology of portal hypertension in different countries.

To determine the presenting features and prognosis of nonalcoholic cirrhosis, retrospective analysis was done in 145 cases. Of the total, 48 patients (33%) belonged to the young (less than or equal to 35 years), and 97 (67%) to the adult age group (greater than 35 years) with no predominance of either sex. The etiology of cirrhosis and the positivity of viral markers were similar in both groups. Adults had on presentation a higher frequency of anorexia while hematemesis was more frequent in the young group (p less than 0.001). During a mean follow-up (+/- SE) of 31.7 +/- 5.5 and 16.3 +/- 2.2 months in the young and adult group, respectively, 68 and 63% cases survived 5 years. Liver failure (53.8 and 44.4%) and variceal bleeding (23 and 11.1%) were the main causes of death in both groups, accounting for 27% mortality in each group.