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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    acid, when deposited from the urine, occurs in two distinct forms, first, as an occasional sediment or cloud ; and, second, in the more permanent shape of gravel, as a firm granular or crystalline mass. I mention this apparently trivial fact, because it leads to a very important distinction, to a point the chemistry of which is to pathology of the highest interest, and which at present is but slightly understood—I mean the origin of the different sub- stances presented to us by the operations of the economy. In the case before us, the two different varieties proceed from different sources ; the light sediment from its transitory nature, evidently arises from the food which has been taken, and disappears with a return to more suitable diet, the more compact form from deeper- seated derangement, in the decomposition of the substance of the body. The different tissues, there is every reason to believe, yield peculiar products of decomposition; thus muscle gives rise to a set of organic compounds of one description, brain to an- other partially or entirely different, and cartilage to a third series probably different from both, just as out of the body dissimilar substances by the same treatment yield compounds of perfectly dissimilar qualities. The nature of the products peculiar to each tissue is almost unknown, though we cannot doubt from analogy that each may again be broken up in products of a different description under the modifying influence of disease ; as in the laboratory we see the same substance capable of yielding dif- ferent compounds as results of its decomposition if the circum- stances of the experiment be accidentally or designedly vai'ied. Besides these uric acid deposits, which when they accumu- late in the bladder, form one variety of calculus, there are others also of frequent occurrence, of which phosphoric acid and mag- nesia or lime, constitute the principal ingredients. These can easily be discriminated from the former by simple chemical tests. Now it is a matter of no mere idle curiosity to ascertain whether we have to deal with a uric acid or phosphoric acid calculus. In the majority of instances they proceed from two very different states of the system, and therefore require modes of treatment widely dissimilar. Again, there are other diseases of which the kidneys give evidence by allowing the formation not of solid deposits, but of substances in solution which are absent in a healthy condition of the secretion. Of these, two of the most imiiortant arc suijaraad albu men, the one a substance which ought not to be ])roduc;e(l at all in the system ; the other forming the principal constituent of the scrum of the blood, and the loss of which therefore drains and speedily exhausts the frame; both by tlicir presence indicate dis- eases of the most serious description. The symptoms, however, by whicli they are usually accompanied, may many of them be B 2
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