Clinical Aspects of Thymic Factors in the Treatment of Immunodeficiency Diseases and Neoplasia: Achievements and Failures

Since Jacques Miller showed the importance of the thymus and the term “T-Lymphocyte” was introduced, there followed much basic research, and tor the past 8 years, a variety of thymic factors have become available for therapeutic studies in man. All those currently available have to be given parenterally, and fall into two main groups, (see Tables 1 and 2). Their modes of action (1) will be briefly mentioned, but primarily to stress the importance of the sequential action of a series of factors.