Sentence:  The importance of knowing in what chemical forms the hormone may exist is accentuated by the recent observation that there exists an abnormally long-acting TSH in blood drawn from <WSD>many</WSD> thyrotoxic patients ( Adams , 1958 ) . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  a quantifier that can be used with count nouns and is often preceded by `as' or `too' or `so' or `that'; amounting to a large but indefinite number