[Personal experience with the use of peroperative biopsy in surgery for intestinal aganglionosis]

The authors examined peroperatively 41 excisions from the muscularis externa of the large bowel in 20 patients operated on account of intestinal dysganglionosis. For visualization of the ganglion cells the reaction for NADH tetrazolium reductase was used. The advantage of this method is that the incubation medium can be very rapidly prepared from a stock solution and that the incubation period is short. The visualization of ganglion cells is by contrast. In all instances it was possible to assess the length of the aganglionic and markedly hypoganglionic portion of the gut and make thus the result of the operation safer.