A report on the destruction of micro-organisms during the progress of inflammation / by M. Armand Ruffer.

  • Ruffer, Sir Marc Armand, 1859-1917.
Date:
1890
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A report on the destruction of micro-organisms during the progress of inflammation / by M. Armand Ruffer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    fore intend to state here in a very few words the deductions which in my opinion are to be drawn from the experiments just described. I must, however, mention here that Rogowitch, in his paper on Quarter-Ill published in Beitrdge zur allgemeinen Patho- logie (V. iv, 4, p. 291) has stated that the leucocytes present in the inflammatory exudations contain no bacilli in their interior. I am quite unable to conceive how this author has arrived at this con- clusion, for in not a single one of my experiments have I failed to find an enormous number of micro-organisms in the interior of leucocytes. Moreover, I have demonstrated this fact to several competent pathologists. In the first place, it is clear that the fluids present in the inflammatory exudation have no toxic influence whatsoever on the pathogenetic bacilli which give rise to the disease called quarter-evil. Not only is there no evidence to show that the fluids have the power of destroying micro-organisms, but they seem to have a stimulating effect on their growth, for the latent bacilli contained in the strong virus (a) are called into activity as soon as the dried virus is bathed in the inflammatory fluids present at the spot where the virus is introduced. On microscopic examination, the bacilli are found to be motile and present the characteristic staining reactions of healthy micro-organisms. Theoretical considerations suggest that if inflammatory fluids have any toxic action at all on the bacilli of quarter-evil, this action ought to attain its maximum when the weak virus (b) is inocu- lated. We see, however, that this supposed toxic action, if it exists at all, is not to be demonstrated by the means at our dis- posal, for the bacilli of the weak virus show signs of active life as soon as they are in contact with the living fluids of the inflam- matory exudations. I have purposely called these fluids living fluids,' for I do not wish to imply that the same liquids, if taken out of the animal body, and after undergoing the peculiar changes which all protoplasmic fluids undergo outside the body, do not have a toxic action on pathogenic bacilli. The properties of dead or coagulated blood, for instance, are utterly different from those of living blood, and the physiological actions of the two fluids are also vastly different. Similarly, the living serum of the guinea- pig has no toxic influence on the bacilli of quarter-evil; but it would be unwise to argue from this that the dead serum of the same animals has no harmful influence on the same bacilli. In the second place, it is evident that the amoeboid cells which mi- grate to the place where the virus is inoculated arrest the progress of the bacilli and have the power of destoying them after taking them into their interior. The migrating cells, packed closely to- gether, form a kind of living wall, shrovgh which micro-organisms can only penetrate with the greatest difficulty. Further, many lymphocytes contain bacilli in various stages of degeneration, and whereas enormous numbers of bacilli are present in the fluids of the inflammatory exudation, very few or none are found in the deeper parts of the tissue. The wall formed by the migrating cells has proved an almost impassable barrier to the micro- organisms. The localisation of the bacilli at the spot where they are introduced is, therefore, due to the action of the amoeboid cells which have migrated to that point. In other words, inflam- mation m this disease serves a useful purpose. Clinically, the local lesion produced is a sign that the animal organism is fighting against the entrance of micro-organisms into the system. In some diseases in which the inflammation at the point of in- oculation (that IS, soft chancre, diphtheria, quarter-evil) is well marked the whole process, as far as the penetration of the micro- organisms IS concerned, ends there, thouijh, in spite of this locali-
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