Diseases of the mouth : for physicians, dentists, medical and dental students / Tr. and edited by John Bethune Stein.

  • Zinsser, Ferdinand, 1865-
Date:
[1912]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Diseases of the mouth : for physicians, dentists, medical and dental students / Tr. and edited by John Bethune Stein. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    27/292 (page 9)
    Vincent angina, has the characteristics of the spiro- cheta buccalis, and may be confused with it. It is chiefly found in the mouth, and may possibly be a saprophytic microorganism in that locality.—Tr.] It stains blue with Giemsa. In the differential diagnosis of the spirochetz of the mouth, the greatest caution is required, because of their close resemblance to one another. A smear may be made from the exudate of the suspected lesion and stained, or the method of Burri (India ink method) may be used to find the microorganism. The best method for determining the presence of the treponema pallidum or other spirochete is by means of the dark-field microscope (dunkelfeld- or ultra- microscope), which permits the study of not only the form but the refringence and movements of the living organism. Formerly, it was necessary to watch the further course of the separate symptoms of syphilis until a positive diagnosis of syphilis could be made; thereby losing much valuable time before treatment was com- . menced. To-day, however, by proving the. presence of the treponema pallidum, a diagnosis can at once be made and the disease immediately treated. The Sero-reaction of Wassermann is at times an important aid in detecting syphilis. The reaction depends upon the fact that in the body the living causal agents of a given disease produce or incite the cells of the body to produce a substance, which is known as the immune body, or antibody. These ex- ceptionally delicate and labile substances have not been analyzed, but through a biological reaction their presence influences the capability of the blood serum to dissolve the erythrocytes of another animal species. The serodiagnosis of syphilis introduced into the practice of medicine by v. Wassermann, Neisser and Bruck, in 1905, is the application to syphilis of a method for the deviation of the complement [discov-