VOA慢速英語:How a 1959 Discovery Saves Premature Babies Today

This is the VOA Special English Health Report.

這里是美國之音慢速英語健康報道。

We told you last week about a study which found that more than ten percent of all babies worldwide are born too early. One common problem in preterm babies is respiratory disease. The lungs are the last organs to develop. But a medicine called surfactant can save babies struggling to breathe.

上周我們談到了一項研究，世界各地10%以上的嬰兒早產(chǎn)。早產(chǎn)兒常見問題之一是呼吸系統(tǒng)疾病。肺是最后發(fā)育的器官。但一種被稱為表面活性物質(zhì) (surfactant) 的藥物可以挽救呼吸困難的嬰兒。

The story of this lifesaving medicine begins with a discovery in nineteen fifty-nine by a researcher named Mary Ellen Avery. She told this story in two thousand five to Children's News at Children's Hospital Boston, where she was the first woman to serve as physician-in-chief.

這種救命藥的故事始于1959年一位名為瑪麗·埃倫·埃弗里(Mary Ellen Avery)的研究員的發(fā)現(xiàn)。2005年她向波士頓兒童醫(yī)院的《兒童新聞》講述了這一故事，她也是該醫(yī)院擔任主任醫(yī)師的第一位女性。

She had been doing research at the Harvard School of Public Health. She was asked to find out more about the foam that forms in the lungs of people with a condition called pulmonary edema. At night she worked in a hospital delivery room. She saw many premature babies with hyaline membrane disease, now called respiratory distress syndrome.

她曾在哈佛大學公共衛(wèi)生學院從事研究工作。她被要求找出更多有關肺水腫患者肺部形成的粘液的信息。晚上她在一家醫(yī)院的產(chǎn)房工作，看到了許多患有肺透明膜病，現(xiàn)在被稱為呼吸窘迫綜合征的早產(chǎn)兒。

51VOA注：從上下文來看，這種粘液(foam)是指肺表面活性物質(zhì)。

She examined the lungs of babies who had died. She found there was no air in their lungs, and she discovered why. In her words, "The material that was important -- the foam -- was missing, and they were struggling to re-inflate their lungs. Nature put this foam, or surfactant, in the lung to lower surface tension. You cannot keep air spaces inflated without it."

她檢查了死亡嬰兒的肺，發(fā)現(xiàn)肺里沒有空氣，并找出了原因。用她的話來說，“這種非常重要的粘液物質(zhì)消失了，而它們在竭力重新擴張肺部。造物主向肺部注入這種活性物質(zhì)來降低肺泡表面壓力。如果沒有沒有它，就沒法保證肺泡空隙膨脹。”

Babies usually develop this coating while they are in the womb, but many premature babies do not.

嬰兒通常會在子宮孕育期間生成這種表面活性物質(zhì)，但許多早產(chǎn)兒未能生成這種物質(zhì)。

Finally, in nineteen eighty, a Japanese pediatrician, Tetsuro Fujiwara, published a study about an artificial surfactant. It could be given to a baby and, within minutes, the baby could breathe.

最后在1980年，日本兒科醫(yī)生藤原哲郎(Tetsuro Fujiwara)發(fā)表了一篇有關人工表面活性物質(zhì)的研究。它可以提供給嬰兒，幾分鐘之內(nèi)嬰兒就能呼吸。

The medical community had taken years to accept Dr. Avery's discovery. But she said in a Harvard Medical School interview in nineteen eighty-two that she never gave up.

醫(yī)學界花了很多年才接受埃弗里的發(fā)現(xiàn)。但她1982年在哈佛醫(yī)學院的面試中表示，她從未放棄。

MARY ELLEN AVERY: "Hanging in there is key, I think. Knowing what you want to do and not being easily discouraged is key, particularly in research. You know, you're always moving into the unknown. And you can spend months trying to prove something, only to find that you made some terrible mistakes and you have to be willing to say 'six months of my life and my hard work went down the drain,' and you have to start over -- that's terrible discouragement."

埃弗里：“堅持是關鍵，我認為。知道自己想做什么同時不要輕易氣餒是關鍵，特別是在研究中。你知道，你不斷地會進入未知領域。你花幾個月時間試圖證明一些東西，結果卻發(fā)現(xiàn)自己犯了一些嚴重錯誤同時不得不說，‘我這六個月的辛勤工作全白搭了。’而你必須從頭再來，這非常氣餒。”

Dr. Anne Hansen in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Children's Hospital Boston remembers the first time she heard about Dr. Avery. It was in nineteen ninety, when the government was in the process of approving an early surfactant called Exosurf.

波士頓兒童醫(yī)院新生兒重癥監(jiān)護室的安妮·漢森醫(yī)生還記得自己第一次聽到埃弗里醫(yī)生。那是在1990年，當時政府正在審批一種名為Exosurf的早期表面活性物質(zhì)。

ANNE HANSEN: "And the attending [doctor] who I was on with said, 'When you're on call tonight, if there's a baby who's born who's premature, you should watch very closely the natural history of that disease, because this is the last night before we're going to start giving Exosurf to all our preterm babies, so this will be your last chance ever in your life to see what a preterm baby does when they don't receive Exosurf.' And then he told me the whole story of Dr. Avery and her discoveries."

漢森：“當時和我一起工作的主治醫(yī)生說，'當你晚上值班時，如果有早產(chǎn)兒，你應該密切觀察這種疾病的自然歷程，因為這是我們將開始對早產(chǎn)兒使用Exosurf前的最后一個夜晚，因此這將是你生命中看到未使用Exosurf的早產(chǎn)兒的最后一次機會。'

Mary Ellen Avery was eighty-four years old when she died last December fourth.

埃弗里去年12月4日去世，享年84歲。