Hans Wolfgang Sachs (1912–2000)

During the Second World War, the German Wehrmacht and the SS tested various chemical warfare agents on prisoners of concentration camps. The SS needed a pathologist to do this. Therefore, Reichsarzt SS Ernst-Robert Grawitz recruited the 32-year-old Hans Wolfgang Sachs. Despite his position as senior pathologist at the office of the Reichsarzt SS, Sachs was spared interrogation and prosecution after 1945, although the prosecution presented a document about chemical warfare and human experiments during the Nuremberg medical trial. In this, Sachs was named as a participant in so-called “N-Stoff” (chlorine trifluoride) experiments. Little is known about Sachs to this day. This article is intended to close this gap. Of particular interest are the motives and reasons why Sachs joined the party and the SS, as well as his career after 1945.

Ultrastaging of sentinel lymph nodes (SLNs) compared to non-SLNs in colorectal (CRca) cancer: Do we need both?

4055 Background: SLN mapping (M) accurately stages many solid tumors including CRca. SLNs are 3–5 times more likely to have metastases (mets) when ultrastaged by microsections and IHC as compared to non-SLNs examined by standard pathological methods. It is unknown whether ultrastaging of initially -ve non-SLNs would lead to higher incidence of +ve nodes. Hence, we retrospectively analyzed all initially -ve non-SLNs by microsections and IHC similar to SLNs in CRca patients (pts) undergoing SLNM to determine its impact on final nodal staging. Methods: All CRca pts underwent SLNM by circumferential subserosal injection of 1% lymphazurin. First 1–4 blue nodes were marked as SLNs and ultrastaged by 4 section with H&E and 1 with IHC. All non-SLNs were initially examined by single H& E section and initial staging was made as per AJCC criteria. We re-examined all initially -ve non-SLNs similar to the SLNs by a senior pathologist blinded to prior results. Results: There were 156 pts with Cca and 44 pts with Rca. SLNM was successful in 100% pts with 94% accuracy rate. A total of 2,755 nodes (13.78/pt) were identified, of which 494 were SLNs and 2,261 were non-SLNs. Nodal positivity was 46% and 16% for Cca and Rca pts respectively. Mets were detected in 20.9% of SLNs vs. 8.6% of non-SLNs (p< 0.0001). The exclusive site of nodal mets was detected in 6.5% of SLNs vs.0.8% of non-SLNs (p< 0.0001). Skip mets were found in 6% of pts. After ultrastaging all initially -ve non-SLNs (n=2,065), only 0.58% (12/2065) nonSLNs became +ve in 12 pts. Of these, 10 pts already had +ve SLNs, hence no change of staging occurred. Only 2/200 pts (1%) with initially -ve non-SLNs were found to have a cluster of tumor cells. Thus, ultrastaging of 2065 initially -ve non-SLNs in 200 pts changed the staging from II to III only in 1% of pts. Conclusions: SLNM is highly accurate in staging CRca. The chance of finding additional mets by ultrastaging of all non-SLNs is extremely low (< 1%), hence of little benefit. Therefore, ultrastaging restricted to SLNs alone will assure accurate staging of CRca. [Table: see text] No significant financial relationships to disclose.