Deaf-mutism / by Holger Mygind.

  • Mygind Holger, 1855-1928.
Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Deaf-mutism / by Holger Mygind. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

    106/324 page 94
    DISEASES IN THE PARENTS.—Numerous authors have considered, besides the diseases and ab- normahties mentioned on p. 62 (ear-disease, insanity, epilepsy, &c.), general debility, alchohohsm, syphihs, &c., in the parents, to be among the remote causes of deaf-mutism. Hartmann has pointed out very justly that the importance of such diseases cannot be proved statistically, because the reports are often uncertain, and also because we have no statistics as to other large groups of individuals with which to draw comparison. There is, however, no doubt that all such diseases which weaken the parents' constitution, may affect the children, partly during foetal life, and partly by ren- dering them more susceptible to external influences after birth. This is especially probable so far as alco- holism—which is common in famihes with nervous diseases—and syphilis are concerned, for which reason they will be considered more closely. On the other hand it must be observed that the parents of deaf- mutes are often apparently in possession of remark- ably robust constitutions, a fact of which everyone who has the opportunity of examining them can easily convince themselves. Alcoholism.—As the abuse of alcohol is particularly common it is necessary to prove its very considerable frequency among the parents of deaf-mutes before we can draw any conclusion as to the part it plays in the etiology of deaf-mutism. In Magdeburg, Wilhelmi found only two cases of abuse of alcohol among parents [108, p. 68]. Of the parents of 382 deaf- mutes in the district of Cologne, Lent only found nine fathers who were dem Trnnke ergeben [loi,
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