The opportunities for performing detailed clinical studies of biliary cirrhosis are limited.
Suitable subjects are relatively rare and they differ in the duration, degree, and etiology of
their biliary obstruction as well as the degree of associated infection. In addition, there is a
need for stable experimental models of cirrhosis in animals whose liver is anatomically and
physiologically similar to man and which are large enough to allow detailed study of the
hemodynamic changes associated with cirrhosis and portal hypertension and their …