The use of pepsine in the diarrhoea of infants / by James S. Hawley, M.D.

  • Hawley, J. S. (James S.)
Date:
1871
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The use of pepsine in the diarrhoea of infants / by James S. Hawley, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    THE USE OF PP]PSINE DIABRHCEi OP INFANTS. In speakins; of the causes of infantile diarrhosa, Dr. West, in his Treatise on the Diseases of Infants, makes the following remarks: You will observe that the period of the greatest prevalence of diarrhoea coincides exactly with the time during which the process of dentition is going on most actively, and that more than half of all the cases of diarrhcBa occur in children between the ages of six months and two years. The older writers oa medicine, whose notice this fact did not escape, attributed the disturbance of the bowels to a sort of sym- pathy between the intestinal canal and the gums, swollen and irri tated by the approach of the teeth to their surface. It must be borne in mind that there exists, during the period of teething, a more abiding cause, which strongly predisposes to its occurrence. All parts of the digestive canal, and of its dependencies, are under- going an active evolution to fit them for the proper assimilation of the varied food on which the young being will soon have to subsist. Just as the salivary glands are now being developed, and pour out saliva in abundance, so the whole glandular system of the intestines assumes a rapidity of growth and an activity of function, which, under the influence of comparatively slight exciting causes, may pass the just limits of health. In too many instances, causes fully adequate to excite diarrhoea are abundantly supplied in the ex-