The treatment of pulmonary consumption : a practical manual / by Vincent Dormer Harris and Edwin Clifford Beale.

  • Harris, Vincent Dormer, 1850?-1931.
Date:
1895
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The treatment of pulmonary consumption : a practical manual / by Vincent Dormer Harris and Edwin Clifford Beale. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    know that the rate of progress of the disease, the varia- tion in its type, and the character of its symptoms depend to a great extent upon certain circumstances in connec- tion with the introduction of the micro-organisms into the body and tlie spread of the infection. Of these, the following are some of the most important: \ the condition of the patient's tissues, whether con- stituted by chemical composition or otherwise to lesser or greater resistance to the attack of the bacillus ; secondly, the seat of the inoculation, some tissues resisting more than others the onslaught of the tubercle bacilli; thirdly, the number and very possibly the activity or virulence of the bacilli which effect an entrance into the tissue. It has been shown that in order to produce tubercular in- fection in an animal it is essential that the number of the bacilli introduced should] be above a certain minimum, and this minimum not only varies for each individual, but also almost certainly varies in the same individual at different times, and, as we have implied above, according to the position or seat of the inoculation. The extension of the disease beyond the primary focus depends chiefly upon the greater or lesser freedom of communication be- tween the initial lesion and the general lymph and blood streams, and also of course upon the greater or lesser power of resistance of the tissues at the seat of the primary focus. Finally, we have learned from the further researches of Koch, and of others who have followed his lead in the investigation of the tubercular processes, that many of the symptoms of phthisis depend upon the action of the bacterial products, highly active and poisonous bodies now generally called toxines, upon the tissues and organs of the body in general, and upon the central nervous system in particular.