Autonomic nerves in rectum and colon in Hirschsprung's disease. A cholinesterase and catecholamine histochemical study.

Abstract

The autonomic nervous system innervates normal bowel in a complicated manner. Study of these nerves has been facilitated by histo- chemical techniques which enable separate identi- fication of adrenergicand acetylcholinesterase (AChE)-containing nerves. The latter are usually considered to be cholinergic, and while their presence in the muscle layers of the bowel wall is well known, little attention has been paid to their detailed distribution. It has usually been con- sidered that the adrenergic nerves are also distri- buted directly to the muscle layers, but recent studies by Norberg (1964), Jacobowitz (1965), and Baumgarten (1967) have shown that these nerves are mainly associated with the myenteric ganglia. The ganglion cells themselves do not contain catecholamines, but possess variable amounts of AChE-activity (Koelle, 1955; Cauna et al., 1961; Gunn, 1968).