Gout : its pathology and treatment / by Arthur P. Luff.

  • Arthur P. Luff
Date:
1898
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Gout : its pathology and treatment / by Arthur P. Luff. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    investigations of Schroder and Minkowski ap- parently were strongly in favour of the view that uric acid was formed in the liver. Schroder * states that the liver of birds contains a high per- centage of uric acid, and that after removal of the kidneys uric acid continues to be formed, and accumulates in the liver and blood. The last- mentioned statement is utterly opposed to the results of Zalesky's experiments on the extirpation of the kidneys of serpents. Moreover, if the liver of birds contained uric acid, and if it passed thence to the kidneys, it must he present in the blood. As will be shown by and by, the blood of birds is quite free from uric acid. Minkowski! succeeded in keeping geese alive from six to twenty hours after extirpation of the liver; after the opera- tion, their urinary excrement contained only 2 to 3 per cent, of uric acid, instead of the normal 60 or 70 per cent. This diminished excretion of uric acid after extirpation of the liver is, however, no proof that the liver is the seat of formation of uric acid. The results are equally compatible with the view that the liver is the scat of production of the antecedents of uric acid only. Dr. Murchison regarded the liver as the seat of production of uric acid, and considered that the pre- sence of the latter in the blood or tissues was clue to functional derangement of the liver, in consequence of which the metabolism of some of the albumen became arrested at the stage of uric acid formation, * Lttdwig's Fcs(schriftrlS87, p. 89. f Arch. Eccp. Path. a. Pharmak., xxi.