Observations on the function of the prostate gland in man and the lower animals. Part II / by Joseph Griffiths.

  • Griffiths, Joseph, 1863-1945.
Date:
[1889]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the function of the prostate gland in man and the lower animals. Part II / by Joseph Griffiths. 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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    are filled with, small irregular cells, forming columns similar to those seen in the prostate. The stroma of the gland is relatively very much increased, and is formed of fibrous connective-tissue. I have also examined the generative organs of the Pig, Bullock, Sheep, and Horse after castration, and found that in each case like changes supervene. In Man. Although opportunities for examining the generative organs of castrated men occur not unfrequently, yet there are but few cases on record, and these cases, chiefly by German authors, have been investigated rather with respect to the general changes in the whole frame, and the degree of approach to that of the female, than to the special changes in the sexual apparatus. Although I have not had an opportunity of examining the state of the prostate in eunuchs, yet I think it will be of interest to make here a few quotations from the reports of others. Professor Gruber,1 in a description of the case of a man cas- trated in early youth, who died at the age of sixty-five years, speaks of the prostate and utriculus masculinus in the following terms:— Diese [Prostata] ist sehr verkleinert. Bei angebrachten Drucke konnte ich den Liquor prostaticus an den Miindungen ihrer Aus- fuhrungs-gange hervorquellen sehen. Die Vesica prostatica s. Utriculus prostaticus, s. virilis, s. Uterus masculinus nach Weber ist unverhaltnissmassig vergrb'ssert, so zwar, dass das hintere Ende derselben von einige Linien den hinteren Umfang der Prostata uberragte. Dr Bilharz, in a thesis entitled Descriptio Anatomical Organorum Genitalium Eunuchi JEthiopis, Berl. 1859, gives the result of the examination of two castrated men, and he con- firmed the observations made by Professor Gruber. Pelican, in a book (Skopzenthum in Russland, 1876, s. 99) devoted to the study of this peculiar sect in Russia, mentions that the prostates in eunuchs are about the size of that found in the child. The above are the only observations that I have been able to 1 Muller's Archiv, 1847, s. 469.