Capsules

P:Deborah Marie and Christine Mary Andrews, 8 months, Chicago twins who were born joined at the head but can now face each other, did so happily for photographers. Both have a normal brain covering (dura mater) except for one small patch, which Christine will soon get; neither has a bony top to her skull, but they will get these at the age of four from their own ribs or hipbones.

P:A steroid called Viadril (chemical kin to cortisone and the sex hormones) shows great promise as an anesthetic, reported two University of California researchers. Dripped into the veins, it has been successfully used in 125 operations. If upheld by mass testing, Viadril could make surgery safer because

1) there seems to be less danger from overdosing than with the anesthetics now most commonly used,

2) it boosts the effectiveness of nonflammable nitrous oxide so that it can replace high explosives such as ether,

3) it helps to relax patients, thus cuts down the need for tricky drugs such as curare.

P:Tornadoes may spread a rare disease, reported Meteorologist Nicholas Manos of the U.S. Public Health Service. Amid the dust they can pick up and spread is the fungus that causes histoplasmosis, a TB-like disease of the lungs, marked also by swelling of the liver and spleen.

P:An electronic stethoscope, many times more sensitive than the ordinary acoustical type, has been developed by the Medical College of the State of South Carolina's Dr. Dale Groom and General Motors' famed Inventor-Consultant Charles F. Kettering. With it, the most minute heart sounds may be "watched" and converted into light waves on a TV screen.

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