The agency of alcohol, as illustrated by accurate dissections : being an account of Professor Sewall's drawings of the stomach, exhibiting its state in health, and under the various stages of alcoholic excitement and disease.

  • Sewall, Thomas.
Date:
[©1843?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The agency of alcohol, as illustrated by accurate dissections : being an account of Professor Sewall's drawings of the stomach, exhibiting its state in health, and under the various stages of alcoholic excitement and disease. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    Plate 6. Cancerous stomach. Two other ' cases. diotl sluUloiily, in tlio vigor of hia days, and lieiglat of his usefulness, lamented and \voi)t by all wiio knew him. No one may hopo to bo weaned from the love of alcoholic drinks, or to be cured of a fit of. intoxication by diminishing the quantity alone, or by substi- tuting one form of the poison for another. As well might the culprit who receives his fifty lashes to-day, expect a palliation of his sufferings by the inflic- tion of forty lashes to-morrow, and thirty the day after, or by substituting the cow-hido for the cat of nine tails. The practice is oj^posed to all experience, and to every principle of man's constitution. The stomach is inflamed, and must bo cured like inflammation produced by other causes, by withholding stimulants, and instituting a cooling antiphlogistic treatment. Plate QG] presents a specimen of the cancerous stomach. It was drawn from the stomach of a gentleman who had for many years followed a sea-faring life. He was not regarded as intemperate, but used Ms grog daily, and was in the habit of taking a glass of brandy in the morning, undiluted, to excite an appetite for breakfast. At length dyspepsia came on, Avith pain and a burning sensation in the region of the stomach, vcmiting of his food an hour or two after his meals, followed by extreme emaciation and death. Upon examination of the body, the whole of the stomach, except a small portion at the left ex- tremity, Avas found in a scirrhus state, its coats thickened to the extent of about two inches, and the cavity of the orja-n so far obliterated as scarcely to admit the passage of a probe from the left to the right extremity; so that for a considerable time before death, none of the nutriment derived fi-om food and drink could have passed into the intestines. Near the right extremity of the stomach was. a cancerous ulcer of the size and appearance represented in the drawing. Since the foregoing case occurred, two others of the same character, and produced by the same cause, have fallen under my observation. In both these, the one a male and the other female, the stomach was thickened, scirrhus, and cancerous, and so extensively disorganized as not to admit of the passage of ilie chyme out at the pyloric orifice. The prominent symptoms in these two cases, also, were excruciating pain, a vomiting of the food in a half digested state, followed by extreme emaciation. These subjects had indulged freely in the use of alcoholic drinks for years, and continued the habit till the stomach would no longer receive it. In these cases of induration, scirrhus and cancer, the pyloric portion of the stomach, is more frequently the seat of disease than the left or cardiac j)ortion, but the cardiac portion of the organ does not always escape, as the following case which occurred in my practice several years since, will show. Mr. C, a sea-faring man of forty-five, belonged for many years to the class of temperate drinkers, but, as he lived on, he became a regular hard drinker, though never a sot. At length he began to complain of occasional fits of dys- pepsia, heartburn and acrid eructations; and these symptoms were followed by a difliculty in passing solid food iuto the stomach, unless when masticated very finely and swallowed in small portions. As he expressed himself, there appeared to be an obstruction in the passage near the stomach. His case was examined by several physicians, who pronounced it to be a stricture in the lower part of the (jcsophagus. But the obstruction did not yield to the remedies for thai disease, and the difficulty increased until nothing but liquids would pass, and; finally even the liquids returned after reaching the point of obstruction. He' suffered from gnawing and lancinating pains in the region of the stomach, as • well as from extreme hunger and thirst. I have known him to swallow two gallons of water in successive mouthfuls in a single night, which would pass to the point of obstruction, and then be regurgitated, aflbrding only momentary relief; and this was his condition several weeks previous to his dissolution. Upon opening the body after death, about three inches of the lower portioni of the a'sophagus was found in a thickened and scirrhus state, the disease ex-