This volume focuses on novel developments in our basic understanding of the anatomy, molecular biology and cell biology of the normal human pancreas, and the mechanisms underlying changes in chronic pancreatitis. It also explores data from epidemiological studies regarding risk factors, the natural history and outcome of patients with disease, and mechanisms underlying pain. Finally it discusses how these novel data are leading to improved medical (including application of gene transfer technology) and surgical treatment of chronic pancreatitis.

This volume is based on presentations at the fifth course on perinatal medicine held in the International School of Medical Sciences at the Ettore Majorana Centre for Scientific Culture in Erice, Sicily, in March 1996. It has had a prolonged gestation, but the presentations have been updated and thus the book will benefit perinatologists internationally.

The introductory lecture, by philosopher Donald Evans, is of great interest, discussing the issues which all those involved in reproductive medicine, in its widest sense, are dealing with all the time but seldom think about or put in...