On the importance of chemistry to medicine : an introductory address to the medical classes of King's College, delivered October 1, 1845 : with an inaugural lecture at King's College, given October 6, 1845 / by W. A. Miller.

  • William Allen Miller
Date:
1845
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the importance of chemistry to medicine : an introductory address to the medical classes of King's College, delivered October 1, 1845 : with an inaugural lecture at King's College, given October 6, 1845 / by W. A. Miller. 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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    iHipart to Pathology be increased and extended. It is not always that, as in the instance just quoted, we can apply our chemical knowledge with such immediate benefit. At present our infor- mation on the subject of Pathological Chemistry is more special than general. We do not yet understand the full meaning of the alterations we perceive. The disturbances we observe are in most cases the results of disease, and not the diseases themselves; hence we are liable to the prevailing danger which so constantly besets us in the practice of medicine, the temptation to treat symptoms rather than to attack the root whence they spring. Still the special services which Pathology receives from Che- mistry are scarcely less important than those which are afforded by it to Physiology, and are of a kindred nature. The first safe step towards the cure of a disease is a knowledge of its nature; and the disturbances of function, which are generally the first to attract the patient's attention and to convince him of the derange- ment of his health, are in very many cases attended with altera- tions in the products furnished by the organs either primarily or secondarily affected. These alterations possess the same value to the physician as means of diagnosis, that the physical signs afforded by auscultation do in diseases of the heart and lungs. They are independent of the patient's sensations, and therefore possess a positive meaning. It is the province of Chemistry to teach us what these alterations are, and to aid in determining their meaning. Circumstances apparently trivial, as the undue preponderance, even in very slight degree, of certain substances whose presence is yet in minute quantity always observed in health, may lay the foundation of serious or irremediable disease. A little considera- tion will render this evident. It has already been mentioned that the great object of digestion is so to modify the food as to bring it into a soluble form of such nature as to be susceptible of absorption from the inner surface of the intestines. This surface may in fact be looked upon as the root of the .animal through which the nutriment enters the system, having previously undergone a certain elaboration in the stomach, an elaboration unnecessary in the case of plants, which absorb their food directly and in a crude state from the soil. Now on the inner surface of the alimentary canal no pores are distinguish- able, even by the microscoj^e. Every thing therefore that is absorbed by it must be in the liquid form. The walls of the blood-vessels themselves are also equally devoid of pores. The body may in fact be regarded a tissue of tubes and membranes, permeable to liquids, but not to solids that they may hold in sus- pension—the wliole being supported on a firm bony framework. It is therefore of high importance that all the products of dccom- n
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