Serums, vaccines and toxins in treatment and diagnosis / by Wm. Cecil Bosanquet and John W.H. Eyre.

Date:
1909
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Serums, vaccines and toxins in treatment and diagnosis / by Wm. Cecil Bosanquet and John W.H. Eyre. 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.

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    strain of bacilli used for the test-cultures, as compared with the organisms which had infected the patients. Kohler1 found that among 100 patients suffering from diseases other than enterica 12 gave a reaction in dilutions of 1 : 20. Among these 12, one agglutinated at 1 : 50, two at 1 : 40, and three at 1 : 30. Hence it appears that even an agglu- tination-reaction in a dilution of 1:50 is not a definite proof of the existence of enteric fever. (2) Again, it has been frequently noticed, and the present writers have had many opportunities of observing, that in some severe and fatal cases of enteric fever, in which the diagnosis is subsequently confirmed by ])ost- mortem examination, no agglutinative power is found throughout the illness. The absence of agglutination is parallel to the absence of resistance exhibited by the patients towards the infective agent. (3) The clumping power of the serum is not developed at the beginning of the attack. The exact period at which it may be looked for is not certain, but many observations have shown that during the first week or even ten days an absence of agglutinative power is rather the rule than the exception. Brion and Kayzer,3 however, find the reaction positive in the first week in 50 per cent, of all cases. (4) Certain other infective and general diseases are apparently capable of producing substances in the serum which will agglutinate typhoid-bacilli. Infection with B. coli communis seems to produce this effect in some cases.0 Allusion has already been made to the experiments of Posselt and Sagasser,1 who found increased clumping power towards B. typhosus in cases of dysentery. Morgan5 found that of six cases of cerebro-spinal 1 Munch, med. Woch., Aug, 13, 1903, p. 1379. 2 Bout. Arch.f. klin. Med., lxxxv., Hft. 5 and 6. 3 Cf. Lubowski and Steinberg, Dent. Arch. f. /din. Med., 1904, p. 396 (proteus-infection, staphylococci, &c). 4 See p. 15. e An Account of an Outbreak of Spotted Fever, &c. Swansea, 1909.